Apple has reported its highest-ever quarterly revenue, mainly due to an impressive surge in iPhone sales, which rose by over 13%. The company's overall revenue now stands at over $94 billion for the past quarter, breaking previous records. Part of this remarkable growth comes from customers’ efforts to preemptively purchase new devices, anticipating possible tariffs on imports. Although Apple still makes most iPhones abroad, especially in China, it is shifting some production to India as geopolitical tensions mount. Imminent tariffs on Indian goods will drive up Apple’s costs by hundreds of millions of dollars, although less than many predicted. Apple faces fierce competition in China, relying on discounts to keep up with rivals, and finds itself lagging in the race to develop and integrate advanced artificial intelligence like its competitors. The company is now ramping up AI investment and is even contemplating acquiring major AI firms to avoid being left behind in this technological arms race.

What a perfect—and yet worrisome—illustration of the dynamism and peril inherent in the modern market economy! There is much to marvel at in Apple’s story: innovation propelled by consumer demand across the globe, titanic sums generated not by government decree, but by the voluntary exchange characteristic of a truly free market. The triumph of Apple here evidences what I have always asserted: when left to their own devices, entrepreneurs create wealth, jobs, and improvements in the quality of daily life, serving consumer preferences with astonishing efficiency.

But alas, even while we celebrate such achievements, the relentless arm of the state intrudes, distorting the glorious machinery of the market through tariffs and trade barriers. Make no mistake—the very surge in pre-emptive purchases, and the costly shift in production geography, arise not from natural market forces, but from the looming threat of government interference. Tariffs on Indian goods, the unpredictable winds of US-China policy, the compulsion to play geopolitical games—these are shackles upon the invisible hand that so skillfully organizes production and distribution. Such meddling not only saps efficiency, but bends the arc of capital, labor, and innovation away from where they are most needed: in the service of the consumer.

Furthermore, one cannot help but note from Apple’s scramble to catch up in artificial intelligence how vital freedom of competition and open markets are to technological progress. Only in a society where entrepreneurs are free to experiment—and to fail!—do you see such breathtaking advances. The mere rumor that Apple, with its vast resources, might buy smaller, innovative firms, or even giants, to catch up in the AI race, illustrates the healthy, sometimes ruthless process of market selection. It is not through government planning or industrial subsidies that progress occurs, but through competitive pressure, risk-taking, and the ceaseless quest to serve the changing desires of millions.

Yet let us not be naïve: should governments take it upon themselves to “guide” this evolution—whether through antitrust zeal, AI regulation, or punitive taxation—all that dynamism would quickly wither. The prosperity shown here is fragile, utterly dependent on a legal and institutional framework that prizes liberty above control.

So, while we stand awestruck by the numbers and the innovative feats, let us remain eternally vigilant against the creeping advance of state interference. Only in the crucible of open, competitive markets, unshackled by protectionism or dirigisme, can mankind continue this upward climb—toward ever-greater abundance and freedom.