I think every American was heartened at the speed that the U.S., and the free world, levied sanctions on the totalitarian regime of Russia.
A few weeks ago, many said we couldn’t turn off Russia’s access to Swift, that would be the equivalent of an economic nuclear strike.
Then BAM! The EU said, “we’re doing this NOW, please join us.”
Many said we couldn’t stop buying Russian oil, because that would hurt the world, including the EU, way too much.
Then BAM! We stopped buying Russian oil.
Just a few weeks ago, who would have thought so many company would join the battle? Google. Facebook. Twitter. Visa. MasterCard. American Express. PayPal. Nike. Adidas. McDonald’s. Starbucks. Coke. Pepsi. Hundreds and hundreds more… all flipping the middle finger to Putin. In fact, if you haven’t stop doing business with Russia yet, something is wrong with you.
China’s reaction to all of this? Silence in the beginning. A lot of folks say that’s just their way, “to observe.”
I think it’s something different. That they originally thought what Putin thought: “No way the U.S. and the EU can ever get their stuff together to act in concert… and certainly whatever they do won’t have teeth.”
But both Putin and China were oh so wrong. The outpouring of support for Ukraine? STUNNING. BLINDING.
UNANIMOUS.
So China went from quiet cockiness to silent terror… now knowing that the free world has a NEW weapon against oppressors: We’ll just turn you off.
It couldn’t have happened 20 years ago… maybe not even 10… but now the world is really so interconnected, that it really is possible to, say, strangle Russia-the-dictatorship-that-oppresses-people to economic death.
With all this momentum, China realized it had to do something.
Of course they didn’t do what would have been truly helpful to peace… and that is whisper in Putin’s ear, “wtf, it didn’t work, stop acting like a madman!”
Instead it’s s-l-o-w-l-y been rolling out support for Russia over the last week or so. Essentially “reminding” everyone we need to de-escalate because it will further mess up global supply chains and such.
Boy, did Xi miscalculate on that one, too.
Talk turned today of “secondary sanctions” against China. If they’re still doing business with a murderous dictator that wants to take away others’ freedom, then maybe we’ll just turn China off, too.
My reaction?
YES! LET’S DO THAT! NOW!!
Then I got to thinking, why wouldn’t we do this? China is mostly a one-way relationship: They economically abuse us. And every time we ask them to play fair, they cry about it.
Then I got to thinking some more: Which American companies would get hurt by this?
And then it hit me: Apple. The world’s most valuable company. The company that derives 19% of its revenue from China. The company that makes almost HALF of their iPhones in China.
This would be an economic disaster of epic proportions for Apple stock.
And since virtually EVERY person on the planet either has money directly in Apple… or their mutual fund does… or their 401K does… or their bank does where they save their money… and so on…
… hurting Apple stock is akin to hurting every person on the planet.
I kid you not.
Remember the dotcom crash? It started (imho) because Microsoft and Intel, the two companies that used to financially represent everyone in the world, missed earnings numbers and sent shock waves through the financial markets. A history-making crash.
So it’s happened before.
We survived… but remember it was awfully rough for a while… and Microsoft stock price, literally, flat-lined for about the next decade.
If sanctions move to China — whether it’s for their support of Russia — or they start moving on Taiwan — I know every American will feel the way I do: YES! LET’S DO THAT! F*ck China. You sell to your oppressed people… and we’ll sell to the FREE world.
If that happens, I’m not sure Apple wouldn’t get caught in an awfully bloody crossfire.
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