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> LOL no there is not a single company or person in the world for whom 13 BILLION dollars is 'absolutely nothing'.

Apple's revenue last year alone was $383 Billion.

This means 3.39% of their worldwide revenue, and an even bigger share of their profits. It's not negligible at all, even though it's just collecting taxes late without a penalty.

Isn't that more than the EU defence budget from 2022? Not gonna lie, I'm kinda a little scared now. I realise that there's less than a 1 in 1 billion chance Apple is gonna set up its own military and attack the EU, but still...

The EU doesn't have "defence budget", the EU isn't a sovereign country, the EU doesn't have any armed forces.

What EU does have is the European Defence Agency (EDA) which is a body that organises collective projects and coordination on behalf of its members.

The EDA's budget in 2023 was €44.8Bn.

Combined defense budgets of all individual member states was 214 billion in 2023. That's 'spending budget', not revenue like the 300 something billion of Apple's revenue cited above.

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