How much cash to the large tech companies have?
A few weeks ago I published an article in Spanish about how much revenue large tech companies have in comparison to some of the countries around the world. To make a long story short, just two to three of the big tech companies put together have more revenue than the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of many countries around the world. And with money comes power.
But how liquid are these companies, i.e. how much do they have in cash and other short term investments, i.e. current assets? As the old saying goes, cash is king, and boy do these tech juggernauts hold the crown. After a few minutes on Google Finance, Wikipedia and some other sites, I found some information, when compared to several governments, helps put things into perspective.
Cash and short term assets on some of the big tech companies balance sheets
- Microsoft has about 75 billion dollars in current assets. It’s not uncommon for them to add between 1-4 billion dollars in cash per quarter.
- Apple has about 47 billion dollars in current assets. They are also generating cash on a quarterly basis at an insane level.
- IBM also has about 47 billion in current assets. Do they generate cash every quarter? Just about, say a billion here, a billion there.
- Google is no slouch either and is in good company, they hold about 47 billion in current assets as well. They hold about 39 billion dollars in cash and short term investments.
- HP surprised me. Even with all their troubles of late they “only” have about 56 billion dollars in current assets.
- Cisco is also insane. They have about 57 billion in current assets.
- Let’s add EMC2 into the mix as well. They have about 10.2 billion dollars in current assets. Their operating cash flow is also solid.
- Dell…. about 30 billion in current assets. Not bad huh?
Let’s add the current assets from these eight companies: that’s about 370 billion dollars in current assets. Remember we’re not talking about total assets here, only cash and stuff they can sell relatively quickly to get cash in a hurry.
Cash balances for some governments
Governments don’t follow the same accounting principles that us mortals do. The closest thing to current assets are international reserves, also known as official reserves or foreign exchange reserves. These are holdings in international currencies (such as the US dollar and Yen), gold, special drawing rights (SDRs) and Internation Monetary Fund reserve positions.
Ok, so we all know China has a lot of cash and cash equivalents handy, to the tune of about 3.2 trillion USD dollars. But they are by far and away the country with the most international reserves.
So, where would the eight companies above rank if they were a country? Number six in the world. That’s right. A few of the countries that would be ranked below:
Brazil (35o billion), United States (142 billion – isn’t that nuts?), India (311 billion), Germany (230 billion), Mexico (131 billion), the list goes on and on.
Considering how much cash these companies have generated in the last ten years, and considering how most developed countries have not improved their international reserve positions, how will they compare 2022?
I’m impressed by your writing. Are you a professional or just very knwoledegalbe?
Thank you sir!
Not a professional writer by any means, just someone that works in the tech sector.
Cheers,
Greg