You’re still missing all marketable securities that can also be easily converted to cash, which is what people are saying when “Apple has $200B in ‘cash.’”

> [Apple] had more than $200 billion in cash and marketable securities at the end of the last quarter…

I know, it's a good article to show you the difference between cash on hand, and all liquid investments that can easily be converted to cash. You're only counting "cash on hand."

That's cash on hand. They have liquid, short and longer term investments that can easily be converted to cash. It was around $200B a year or so ago, but it is getting smaller.

Exactly. Mergers or Acquisitions aren’t for firms in financial trouble only. It works great for two massive, profitable companies where there are synergies, where both shareholders benefit (combined value is greater than value of both firms before a merger). There are some synergies here, but not a lot, which is why it's neither a slam dunk nor nonsense. Those synergies will increase with Apple's movement into entertainment and Reality experiences. There's a reason why there's chatter of it from both inside and outside the company. Far from nonsense.