Why all of a sudden tech companies are not being favorable to their users?
YouTube disallowing adblockers, Reddit charging for API usage, Twitter blocking non-registered users. These events happen almost at the same time. Is this one of the effects of the tech bubble burst?
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Companies expect infinite profit growth
I always found this particularly odd. Is it greed, or some sort of business culture that is ingrained?
Correct me if I'm wrong but this is baked into capitalism. Stocks are attractive to investors because they want to sell them for a higher price later on, and stock prices increase when the company grows.
You're right, thats a requirement for investing into a stocks value. A company can make a healthy flat profit every quarter and its direct benificiaries (investors, stock-holders, directors, owners) will be appropriately accomodated financially via dividends. It doesn't need to be 30% growth year in year out. You start to add stock price, inflation, etc. and it gets complicated. I don't understand it from then on.
My understanding is a little shaky too. I suppose companies are incentivized to target infinite growth so they can get the most money out of the stocks they hold, but this is a culture and greed thing, not a hard requirement.
Not every stock has to be a growth stock, their value can be based on expectations of future dividends.
However, tech stocks are priced assuming growth, so the owners would lose a lot of money if it becomes clear that growth is no longer possible.
I know about dividends but decided to keep the comment simple. Aren't dividends relevant only in utility and holding companies?
Kind of, because those sectors are widely known to not be growth-oriented. There is only so much demand for electricity for example.
At one point that was probably a growth sector, but now it is ubiquitous. Perhaps someday some tech stocks could be focused on dividends rather than infinite growth.
It's just capitalism. It's built on infinite growth.