Apple Building Command Center In Arizona, Not California -- February 3, 2015

Apple will build "global communications command center" in Arizona, not California. Macrumors is reporting:

Apple plans to take over the Mesa, Arizona factory where GT Advanced was formerly producing sapphire boules, transforming the facility into a massive $2 billion data center, reports CNBC. The data center will reportedly act as a "command center" for Apple's global data network.  

According to Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, the center will house 150 full-time Apple employees and its construction at the 1.3 million square foot facility will create 300 to 500 additional jobs.

I assume Apple would have preferred California. Little by little, Apple is moving east.

In a statement, Apple called the investment one of the largest it had ever made and pledged that the facility would run on 100 percent renewable energy like the company's other data centers.

Renewable energy makes sense for this type of operation. More important than renewable energy is an uninterruptible power supply not connected to the national grid. Apple is simply brilliant. 

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See disclaimer. 

Reporting today:

• Edwards Lifesciences (EW), forecast 95 cents; Edwards Lifesciences Corp. (EW) on Tuesday reported fourth-quarter net income of $109.2 million; profit of $1 per share. Earnings, adjusted for one-time gains and costs, came to $1.06 per share. The results topped Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 94 cents per share.
• Arch Coal (ACI), forecast -$0.38 cents -- a loss of 38 cents; a smaller quarterly loss, but suspended its annual dividend, citing weak coal prices. Peabody Energy Corp, the largest U.S. coal miner, slashed its quarterly dividend last week on expectations that prices of natural gas would stay low in 2015, keeping a lid on demand for coal. Arch Coal's net loss shrank to $240.1 million, or $1.13 per share, in the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, from $371.2 million, or $1.75 per share, a year earlier.
  Revenue rose 3.6 percent to $745.2 million.
• National Oilwell Varco (NOV), forecast $1.60; reported fourth-quarter earnings of $595 million. On a per-share basis, the Houston-based company said it had profit of $1.39. Earnings, adjusted for non-recurring costs and amortization costs, were $1.84 per share. The results exceeded Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of $1.60 per share.
  The oil and gas industry supplier posted revenue of $5.71 billion in the period, which fell short of Street forecasts. Analysts expected $5.72 billion, according to Zacks.
• New York Times (NYT), forecast 24 cents; New York Times Co reported a 9.6 percent drop in quarterly net profit due to costs related to job cuts and increased spending on its digital offerings. The company's net income attributable to shareholders from continuing operations fell to $35 million, or 22 cents per share, in the fourth quarter from $38.7 million, or 24 cents per share, a year earlier.
• UPS, forecast $1.25, Higher spending to gear up for the crush of holiday-package deliveries pushed fourth-quarter profit down 61 percent at UPS, and the company gave a tepid outlook for 2015 earnings. UPS shares rose in premarket trading Tuesday. United Parcel Service Inc. said Tuesday that it earned $453 million, or 49 cents per share, in the last three months of 2014, compared with $1.17 billion, or $1.25 per share, a year earlier.

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