Daily Authority: 🖨️ Buffett buys some printers

🍌 Good morning! Oh the fruit show was great! Clearly, many companies want to showcase their machines and concepts for packaging, cleaning, processing, quality control, vision systems, and so on. But also: fruit! Amazing to see such brands as Chikuita Banana, with a small farm-sized booth and a force of corporate suits hoping for more sales. Also in the invention: a no-tear, no-smell onion. Hmm!

Buffett buys 10% of HP (or four ink cartridges)

Something different for you today: PC and printer maker HP has been given a seal of approval by Warren Buffett (aka, a lot of money) (FT):

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway announced late Wednesday that it had bought a stake in computer and printer maker HP Inc., valued at $ 4.2 billion, the latest sign that the broader consortium and its billionaire investors are finding value in the US stock market.

This is a big deal when Warren Buffett and his collective company, Berkshire Hathaway, set foot in a company, although Buffett did not go for the Elon Musk-style intervention method, as he started with Twitter.

Don’t underestimate Omaha Oracle:

• Buffett, now 91, and his right-hand man, Charlie Munger (98), have shared his thoughts and ideas on investing for decades, always ignoring the patient’s investment game, ignoring market changes and talking about shopping at a lower time.
• To give you an idea, when he bought Coca-Cola in 1988, he said: “In 1988, we made a major purchase of Coca-Cola. We hope to hold on to these securities for a long time… in fact, when we own some part of outstanding business with outstanding management, our favorite holding period lasts forever.
• While Buffett / Berkshire bought 5% of Apple in 2016, Apple stock has not done much in a few years. It had an iPhone, but did not see much growth in the market.
• As always, Buffett’s bet on Apple was right: Berkshire has spent $ 100 billion on its investment in six years. (CNBC).

So, why HP?

• HP, along with Dell (and Apple), have had good years behind the PC market boom while working and studying মহ epidemic months and years from home.
• The day Buffett announced his position in the morning, a report noted that HP and Dell stocks fell as consumer spending was expected to slow.
• I’ve seen HP Inc’s recent quarterly performance: hardware sales of PCs and laptops and monitors, and so HP made 12.2B, while its printing division made $ 4.8B, printing at a much larger margin.
• (HP’s total price is 36B, a little less than Apple’s ~ $ 2T rating!)
• (Also, Xerox tried to buy HP in 2019-2020 for $ 24 a share, but backed out due to the epidemic. HP’s shares are currently ~ 40. Ouch).

Why it’s important:

• I mean, it’s not. Buffett won’t ring HP and ask them to put an edit button on the printer, and the original HP business won’t change.
• But at the same time, it’s a big signal: Buffett doesn’t think PCs and accessories or printers are leaving – he believes in HP leadership and business and brand.
• HP has no really close followers in our exciting market right now, and has not had a smartphone or tablet since 2016, including the 6-inch Elite X3, which runs Windows 10.
• But it is also a top name forever, and its Specter and Omen brands are strong.
• My simple takeaway is: HP looks better after all.

Roundup

📱 OnePlus Nord N20 Display, with OLED and In-Display Fingerprint Sensor Confirms Immediate Release in USA (Android Authority).

“Peloton Guide won’t let me skip a push-up” (Engage).

“ELI5: Why are spacecraft called ships instead of planes?” (r / explainlikeimfive)

Throwback Thursday

Remember when OpenAI released the DALL-E machine learning system that can create images?

You’ve probably seen it but haven’t tried it on the waiting list, but OpenAI’s DALL-E 2 is here now, boasting a higher resolution and less latency than the original, and it can even edit existing images.

It creates beautiful wild images of what you can imagine, even long strings, such as “Shiva Inu the dog wearing a beret and a black tortoise”:

Or: “A bowl of soup that is a portal to another dimension as a digital industry”:

• Check it out here, but just be aware that it’s not yet possible for the public to use it, although you can join the waiting list …

Cheers,

Tristan Rainer, Senior Editor.