Apple Profits Fall And Growth Slows. Welcome To The New Normal

via readwrite.com

Apple reported its first profit decline in over a decade and bluntly admitted that its growth is slowing. It was, indeed, a strange but not wholly unexpected change of pace for the wildly successful Cupertino company.

Despite that bad news, the stock market barely hiccupped. As of writing, Apple shares were virtually unchanged in after-hours trading from their close of $406.13 — a level roughly 42% below their peak just seven months ago. Which means that these diminished expectations are, for now, Apple's new normal.

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Want To Raise A Million Bucks? Here’s What You’ll Need

via techcrunch.com

So, you’ve built yourself a nice little product. Maybe you’ve raised a small friends-and-family round; maybe you’re still bootstrappin’ on your own. Either way, now you’re looking to raise at least a million dollars to help with the next steps.

While there’s no perfect formula for stuff like this, these stats from AngelList’s Ash Fontana are a pretty good indication of the metrics you should be aiming for.

As part of a presentation at a startup gathering in Santiago, Chile this evening, Ash presented a slide outlining some ballpark metrics that startups should aim for before swoopin’ in for a big first round...

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5 Practical Tips for Perfecting Your Startup Pitch

via mashable.com

We are living in the age of the entrepreneur — more people are starting up, and it's ever important to stand out in the crowd. When pitching investors, then, it's crucial that entrepreneurs do their research, understand what's expected of them and pitch accordingly.

We spoke to a handful of venture capitalists and startup entrepreneurs to get their top tips on how to put together the ideal startup pitch. Here are the best five tips we heard.

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Foursquare Borrows A Massive Amount Of Money To Survive

via businessinsider.com

Foursquare is borrowing $41 million from private equity firm Silver Lake and venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz, Union Square Ventures, O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, and Spark Capital.

Silver Lake is leading the debt round. The money from the VC firms is convertible debt.

Bloomberg BusinessWeek's Sarah Frier broke the news this morning.
It reports that Foursquare generated just $2 million in revenues last year...

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Why Fab.com Dominates Social Media Commerce While Other Brands Struggle

via businessinsider.com

With high profile brands such as Gap, Gamestop and, in the US, JCPenney, having opened and then subsequently closed Facebook stores (presumably because they weren't delivering ROI) it would be easy to assume that social media is not suitable for sales – too easy, perhaps.

But those who dig a little deeper may find that opportunities abound if social media is leveraged in the right way.

"We haven't tried to use social as a sales channel at all. It doesn't suit our demographic and we're not a discounter," argues Andrew Curran, chairman at luxury homewares e-tailer Amara. "Having said that, there are examples – take Fab.com – of retailers for which social is a significant proportion of what they do and drives a large percentage of their business."

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Financing Your Web Designs

via graphicdesignjunction.com

Whether you’re looking for something for personal use or something for a commercial business, there are quite a few things that you need to consider when it comes time to decide on a web design. One of the biggest factors you’re ultimately going to have to think about is the price.

Decide if it’s something you want to take on yourself or have someone else do for you. There is quite a large number of options out there for people who want to try their hand and making their own web designs, some of which are even free. Many web hosting companies will allow you the option of building your website right from their services.

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Infographic: Gaming Development Financial Realities

via blog.profitbricks.com

In honor of #GDC2013 going on this week in San Francisco, ProfitBricks is pleased to present this infographic, entitled “Gaming Development – The Financial Reality Behind Great Ideas.” People at the show are confirming what we already suspected: gaming is moving into the cloud. As thin clients in browsers, on laptops, or on mobile devices, continue to grow in popularity, they need a back-end to store data and process large environment mechanics, while the front end focuses on graphics and the human interactions.

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Who Will Win As Mobile Payments Go Mainstream?

via businessinsider.com

Consumers gravitate to convenience. That's as true with payment technologies as it is with anything else. A prime example is the decades-old trend away from cash or checks and toward credit cards.

Now, the mass adoption of smartphones and tablets has set the stage for a new move — away from fixed-point, card-based transactions and toward those completed on mobile. The old dream of the "digital wallet" is coming true in a very particular mobile-led fashion.

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7 Questions To Test Your Financial Literacy

via forbes.com

Did you know that April is Financial Literacy Month? With taxes fresh on your mind and spring cleaning in the air, it’s as good a time as any to brush up on your financial literacy. After all, as we’re required to make more and more financial decisions, financial literacy is becoming almost as important as being able to read and write.

So where should you start? While you can literally read entire books about financial planning, I’ve repeatedly come across several common misunderstandings that can lead to big financial mistakes. To test your financial literacy, see how well you answer the following questions...

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Samsung estimates $7.75 billion in Q1 profits, up 45 percent over last year

via theverge.com

Samsung is announcing its earnings estimate for Q1 2012, and everything seems to be on the upswing. The company thinks its operating profit will land between 8.5 and 8.9 trillion won ($7.56 - $7.92 billion) for the quarter — that’s a big increase over the 5.85 trillion won the company pulled in during the same quarter last year. Revenues are also up, from 45.27 trillion won a year ago to somewhere between 51 and 53 trillion ($45.39 - $47.17 billion) this time around.

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The Future Of Mobile Commerce Is Bright

via businessinsider.com

Mobile phones are the most widely spread electronic devices on the planet. According to The International Telecommunication Union, in August 2012 there were about 7 billion mobile phones. This number exceeds the number of PCs by about 3.8 times. Here are a few trends in the industry...

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Ten Financial Planning Moves For The Big Career Shift

via forbes.com

You might need to live on less, at least initially, when you start-over in a new field or ramp up a small business venture. A snapshot of your income, debts, and savings will help you see where you can make some adjustments. Ask what luxuries you can do without: Restaurants? Dry cleaning? Vacations?...

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The Top Ten Most Expensive Movies Ever Made

via mint.com

Over the past weekend, my husband and I got to enjoy a date night. As those of you with young children probably know, date nights become few and far between once the kids come along, so we were pretty excited to get to spend some time together.

The date was your standard dinner and a movie affair. We went out to our favorite restaurant then headed to the theater to check out Oz the Great and Powerful.

I’ll admit it’s been awhile since I’ve been to see a movie in the theater. The ticket price was a bit alarming. We saw the regular version of the movie, and the cost was $11. If we’d chosen the 3-D version, it would have jumped to $20 per person.

We gripe about the cost to go see a movie, which is now just over $8 nationwide (not counting 3-D movies). But, the average cost to make a movie is over $65 million, as of 2007, which makes a $10 or $11 ticket pale in comparison.

While $65 million seems like a lot to most of us, it is nowhere near the cost of the most expensive movies. Check out the film budgets of the 10 most expensive films...

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5 Ways to Make Passive Income For Freelance Designers

via hongkiat.com

Each day, more and more freelancer designers are looking for a way to earn more money than the usual client work or full-time position they have. In the following article we will discuss a lot of ways how you can earn more from being a freelance designer.

The one true weapon a freelancer has is total freedom on how to manage their time and work. That can be put to good use to diversify the income streams. There is more than one way to make a buck on the Internet.

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Is Equity Crowdfunding A Threat To Venture Capitalists?

via techcrunch.com

It’s fun to ponder the awesome disruptive power that equity crowdfunding might have over the venture capital industry. The very people who spend their days plotting the disruption of any industry touched by technology are themselves displaced by hordes of technology-enabled angel investors. How ironic.

VCs are even playing along. Take FirstMark Capital Managing Director Lawrence Lenihan’s response when asked if crowdfunding platforms threaten his business: “Why should I as a VC not view that my industry is going to be threatened?”

We’ve all heard ad nauseum about the JOBS Act, the proliferation of equity crowdfunding platforms (of which there are now over 200) and how they’re going to turn everyone and his grandmother into a startup investor. But could this realistically threaten the protected kingdom that is venture capital?

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Apple To Investors: OK, OK, We'll Show You The Money

via readwrite.com

If you listen to a rising chorus of Apple investors, it seems increasingly clear that Cupertino will soon dance a Wall Street jig and offer either a share-buyback plan or a higher dividend. Either of which would help support the share price, even if neither move seems likely to restore much of the 40% haircut the stock has taken since September.

Yesterday, Bloomberg quoted fund managers at Gamco and Capital Advisors, both of which own Apple shares, saying they expect the company to announce new plans for deploying more of its $137 billion cash hoard in support of investors. Today, Quartz reported that Apple might buy back stock, hike the regular dividend or issue a special dividend as early as this spring, and has retained Goldman Sachs to review its options.

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How Retail Startup Nomi Raised $3 Million In 13 Days

via businessinsider.com

While most of you were watching re-runs of Miracle On 34th St over the holidays, my partners and I were fundraising.

In thirteen days we raised three million dollars. Sound like a fairy tale? That’s because it is.

The formal fundraising process from first meeting to close may have taken thirteen days, but the reality is much more complicated. Laying the groundwork for that fundraise required years of hard work, longstanding relationships, and even then, a good deal of luck.

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13 Money-Saving Tips For A Richer 2013 [Infographic]

via bitrebels.com

Living and breathing in this world of ours is not getting any cheaper. More and more services are made available to us, and even though our technology gets cheaper, we still want more gadgets and devices. It’s a never ending avalanche of spending that isn’t getting any easier to manage, especially in the economic climate which has embraced the world today. But you could still live a rich 2013 thanks to these 13 money-saving tips I am about to present to you.

Even though it might not seem like it at this moment, there are a lot of things you can save money on. There are far too many people in the world who think swag is necessary in order to fit in. It’s far from it. If you can cut down on that, and instead save your money, you could change your life for the better. Sure, living a little is good for the soul, but extensive spending and ignorance can easily cut the bottom out of anyone’s economy. I think it’s important for everyone to embrace a few money-saving tips every once in a while. It helps us to stay grounded.

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Who's Manipulating Apple Stock With This iWatch Story?

via readwrite.com

That was the cry from Apple fanbloggers last month when the Wall Street Journal reported that Apple had reduced component orders, a possible sign of softening demand for Apple products. That story broke nine days before Apple was to report its earnings, and sent the stock reeling downward.

But if that was the case, then who’s manipulating Apple stock now, with this sudden barrage of “leaks” about the iWatch?

Does no one else think it’s kind of remarkable that this unreleased product suddenly starts showing up in dozens of blog posts and press stories? And that these leaks happened, coincidentally, right after Apple’s stock endured a brutal slide from just above $700 in September to a low of $435 in January?

The last stock plunge took place after Apple reported disappointing earnings for the holiday quarter, and ended up treading water in the $450 range. That was Jan. 28.

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Why Amazon wants its own currency

via theverge.com

Despite the failures of Facebook Credits, Microsoft Points, and the dot-com virtual currency Flooz, Amazon has decided to mint its own money. The ecommerce giant announced today that customers will soon be able to use a new virtual currency called Amazon Coins to buy apps and make in-app purchases in the awkwardly-named Amazon Appstore for Android on Kindle Fire.

Customers tend to dislike, nay abhor, the unnecessary process of transferring between their home currencies and virtual tender — just look at Microsoft, which forces customers to spend $1 to buy 80 Microsoft Points in order to make purchases in the Xbox Live Marketplace. With the Nintendo Points system, customers must buy a different set of points in order to purchase games for the Wii versus the handheld DSi console. Gamers loathe this practice, which at the very least forces them to do math before they can tell how much a rental or purchase truly costs.

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