Samsung isn't so stupid, nor is Apple, nor is most all the handset market players.

Gas prices, plastics, etc. down the line have not reverted to where they should be yet. In general, they should or the amount of companies taking advantage of the spread unless blocked by political favoritism like California's gas blend will increase as the oversupply hits every overprices segment. Yes the amount that can be refined is large. Whether it will be utilized is a question. The answer looks to be that it won't or else oil itself would not be falling the way it is.

Very interesting and insightful. It is rather sad that so many people lost their homes in the last hyped bank market and now so many homes are now owned by the TBTF banks that perpetrated the fraud as well as companies such as this. Still, hopefully there will be good times again and all those who lost their homes or wanted ones can get them at a reasonable price again. Sadly this probably won't happen as banks, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Institutional investors are dead set to keep the property markets up and prevent the glut in housing to open up the market. Likewise, Fannie and Freddie pretty much control the low and mid range market much like a communist government controls housing. Socialism at its best has made a strong foothold in American property. Strangely its to the benefit of the few at the cost to the many, just like it was in Russia, N Korea, and everywhere else socialist/communist ideas take root.

LOL, I'd be bearish on Apple just for building the biggest land based spaceship in history for a absurd amount of money. Their excuse is we have the money, Steve Jobs wanted to build it, and we have no new innovations so we might as well live in comfort while we can. Yes Steve Jobs wanted to build it, but he was smart enough not to waste the money. Obviously they are dumb enough to do it. I wonder what else he wanted to do?

Spending in the US will be reallocated, not increased. A good statement indeed and very descriptive of what is going on. Sadly, those who benefit are already spending their extra income and those who are set to pay a very steep price have yet to realize just how bad they will be in a few months.

It takes a while for capitulation when the Federal Reserve and the government are still trying to plunge protect things by telling banks to buy stocks and financing them through QE. Even so, the upturns last shorter periods of time and even the dumb people are starting to notice something isn't right.

Accounting has been going straight downhill for a long time. Recent horror stories are TBTF banks not needing to mark to market and older ones are allowing companies like Salesforce to sell people on their hyped numbers rather than their actual results. They should be required to state that their modified statements are not approved by the IRS or any legal agency.

Please look at the facts. The wage income barely grew above inflation and that suggests all that happened was seasonality and more full time jobs being canned for a few more part time jobs with no benefits. If this is progress we must be living in the USSR.

It is interesting to note that the wage numbers didn't spike up showing the increase in jobs the market hemmed and hawed about was full time workers getting replaced by more part time workers, probably to save on cost not increase. If you get a number for full time workers and subtract out part timers you will see why people are saying the US never recovered, which is quite telling, especially given the amount of money thrown at special interests and spent in government to get the economy better.

In fact, if you strip out government jobs you will see why people like me are saying capitalism is on the brink of getting wiped out by central bank/gov planning and socialism. The real economy has been in reverse for years now with the facts obscured by feeding frenzies through government and central bank actions to feed their specific clientele and mask the real damage like the housing market socialized through fannie and Freddie.

It is interesting to note that wage growth is almost nil, pressing slightly above inflation at 1.7%. This correctly means that employers are hiring more part time workers and offsetting this with fewer full time workers. Is this the great recovery we've been waiting for? More useless fluff. I wonder how many of these great hires are for temporary work or to be Santa Clauses on the street. A recovery this doesn't make let alone a strong recovery.