This post originally appeared at 24/7 Wall St. 

HTC, Motorola (NYSE: MMI), LG and Nokia (NYSE: NOK) might as well curtail their efforts in the smartphone arena. The industry has only two companies left with the ongoing opportunity for extremely large sales — Samsung and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL).

A new study from Strategy Analytics shows that in the fourth quarter Apple shipped 37 million smartphones and overtook Samsung to become once again the world’s number one smartphone vendor by volume. Global sales of smartphones were up 54% to 155 million units. Between Apple and Samsung, sales were almost 74 million for the period — nearly half of the total.

Samsung announced its fourth-quarter earnings about the same time as Strategy Analytics released its figures. Its net income rose 17% over last year’s quarter to $3.6 billion. Over the course of 2011, the South Korean company shipped 300 million handsets. Apple’s recently announced earnings were even more impressive.

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NEW BRITIAN, Conn. (AP) — Stanley Black & Decker Inc. said Wednesday that stronger sales, higher prices and a recent acquisition helped boost its fourth-quarter profit nearly 20 percent.

The tool maker reported after the market closed that it earned $165.3 million, or 99 cents per share, for the quarter. That’s up from $137.8 million, or 81 cents per share, in the same quarter last year.

After adjusting for $83.7 million in one-time charges related to mergers and acquisitions, the company earned $1.36 for the period versus $1.07 last year.

Black & Decker’s total revenue increased 17 percent to $2.79 billion for the quarter, with stronger revenue across all its business lines.

The quarter beat analysts’ average forecast for $1.29 per share on revenue of $2.78 billion, according to FactSet.

The company was weighed down by lingering costs related to several deals. Stanley Works agreed to buy Black & Decker in a deal that closed in 2010. The company also announced earlier this year that was acquiring Swedish commercial security and monitoring company Niscayah Group AB.

Stanley Black & Decker makes hand tools, locks, fasteners and other hardware products.

“We are proud of all we accomplished in the face of a choppy and unpredictable global macroeconomic backdrop,” Stanley Black & Decker’s President and CEO, John F. Lundgren said in a statement.

The company earned $674.6 million, or $3.97 per share, for the full year. That’s up from $198.2 million, or $1.24 per share, in the prior year. After adjusting for one-time items, the company earned $5.24 per share this year, versus $4.15 per share last year.

Its revenue was $10.38 billion, up from $8.34 billion in 2010.

Stanley Black & Decker said it expects to earn $5.75 to $6 for the full 2012 fiscal year, excluding a number of special charges. After adjusting for these costs, some cost cuts and anticipated lower share count, the company expects to earn $4.71 to $4.97 for the full year.

Analysts forecast earnings of $5.91 per share for the year.

Shares of Stanley Black & Decker, which is based in New Britian, Conn., rose $2.45, or 3.5 percent, to close at $72.34 before the company released its results. They fell $1.27 in after-hours trading.

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Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed an interesting stat on today’s earnings call: iPads outsold desktop PCs in the fourth quarter of 2012.

Apple reported 15.4 million iPads sold.

Cook was citing IDC figures for desktop PC sales.

That’s a stunning development. Two decades ago, Microsoft’s mission statement was “a PC on every desk and in every home.” That mission statement no longer makes sense. Computing has gone totally mobile, and while Windows still ships on most of the portable PCs in the world, the iPad is coming up incredibly fast.

That doesn’t even take smartphones into account — Apple sold 37 million iPhones during the quarter, too. Add Android phones into the mix and Windows probably made up less than 50% of all Internet connected devices sold in the last quarter of 2011. (Reliable Android stats are hard to come by, as Cook noted on the call.)

Another way of looking at it: the iPad is now equal to 17% of the overall PC market, which Gartner pegged at 92.2 million units in the last quarter of 2012. In June, it was at 11%. A year ago, it was 7%.

No wonder Microsoft is making such a big bet on tablets with Windows 8.

The problem is, by the time Windows 8 comes out, the iPad will have been on the market, unopposed, for more than two years. If current trends continue, it will be equal to about 25% or 30% of the PC market.

Right now, there is no tablet market. There’s an iPad market.

Microsoft and its PC partners are going to have to spend an awful lot on advertising to change that perception.

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The Patriots defeated the Ravens 23-20 yesterday, but Tom Brady wasn’t thrilled about how he played.

In his post-game press conference Brady said:

“Well, I sucked pretty bad today, but our defense saved us. And I’m going to try to go out and do a better job in a couple weeks.”

And his poor play kept him up all night. This morning on his regular WEEI Boston radio show, Brady said he didn’t get much sleep last night, and the play that kept him up was his pass that was intercepted by Matthew Slater in the fourth quarter.

Brady also mentioned he still can’t watch highlights from the Pats’ loss to the Giants in the 2008 Super Bowl.

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The New England Patriots are headed to the Super Bowl after beating the Ravens 23-20 today in Foxboro.

The Patriots didn’t play their best game, but the Ravens missed a short field goal with 15 seconds left to clinch it.

The best highlight game midway through the fourth quarter, when Ravens CB Jimmy Smith picked off a Tom Brady deep ball after his teammate Bernard Pollard batted it right to him.

Good teamwork.

Here’s the video, will post the missed FG shortly:

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Economists Nouriel Roubini and Ian Bremmer appeared on Bloomberg TV today to discuss all the major issues in the global economy right now.

The biggest focus? China.

While they butted heads about the immediacy of the threat, both pointed out that political tensions between the U.S. and China are going to significantly influence the global economy.

A few more notable tidbits via Bloomberg TV. Watch the whole video below:

Roubini on Greece:

“Even if they reach an agreement there are going to be so many holdouts that then they’ll have a problem. They’ll either pay the holdouts and that becomes expensive, or if they don’t pay them you’ll have a series of defaults, because they’re going to stop paying them. Or the way to avoid the holdouts from being holdouts is then to change domestic legislation, to cram down the terms of the majority on the holdouts. But if that happens then the CDS will trigger and that becomes a credit event. So either way you’re going to get a credit event.”

“The credit event can be two forms, either a form of default…another one is if there are holdouts and you don’t pay them and technically that’s a default on the bonds on which you don’t pay so there’s a series of defaults on which you don’t pay. Or three, if you change the terms of the bonds through legislation then that’s considered a credit event by ISDA by the event triggering the CDS. And one way or another you get a credit event. One extreme is a default, another one is CDS triggering.”

Roubini on the chances of recession in the U.S.:

“I would say latest numbers out of the US have been better for the fourth quarter. I even expect a slowdown so I think the probability of a recession in the United States is lower than 60 percent right now….A lot depends on the eurozone, if the eurozone situation becomes disorderly.”

Bremmer on geopolitics:

“The economics are driving the geopolitics and that’s after decades when security issues drove the geopolitics, the U.S. talking about geopolitics.  U.S. talking about economic statecraft right now about, they’ve done this not in a proactive way, they’ve done this because American allies in Asia have been begging for the US to show commitment, whether it’s Singapore or Vietnam, whether it’s Japan or all the rest.”

Bremmer on China’s Obama concern:

“The Chinese are very concerned about what the Obama administration defense policy will be in the region, and saying that the Chinese are opaque. This will lead to more confrontation over the South China Sea, over the East China Sea, because the Chinese clearly want to ensure that they’re not on the back foot in a part of the world that’s utterly critical for their own security sensibilities.”

Roubini, Bremmer on China:

Roubini: “I do expect there’s going to be a significant slowdown of growth in China this year.  We’re going to see it already in the Q1 numbers…the Chinese will react by reducing the reserve requirement ratio and interest rates to try and jumpstart the economy…I think it’s going to happen in the first half of the year.”

Bremmer: “When it comes to the United States and China let’s be clear. Structurally these countries are moving towards more conflict. These are the world’s two largest economies and that clearly is problematic in terms of economics volatility over the longer term. But as of this year the American economy is dominating, not foreign policy. And there can be a little bit of noise on Iran, a little bit of noise on China. When it comes to currency, the Chinese have been moving at their pace, very slowly, very incrementally, and American politicians have to show they don’t like it. But to be clear, American multinational corporations are perfectly happy with it, they manufacture in China. They are on the other side of it. It’s American Labor that has the problem with it. And they don’t have a lot of influence with the Republicans right now.”

Roubini on whether the slowdown in Europe and the United States will spread:

“In the case of the eurozone it’s clearly the periphery is not just in a recession but a deepening recession. So the eurozone is in a recession, the UK looks like it’s going towards a recession. The data from the United States has been somehow more mixed, positive lately but in my view the process of deleveraging the public and private sector is going to continue that implies slow domestic growth demand and the exports of the United States are not going to improve.”

Bremmer on Iran oil sanctions:

“The main implication behind the oil sanctions against Iran is that China will get cheaper oil from Iran, let’s be clear about that. But leaving that aside, the Obama administration has actually recently said that purpose of those sanctions is regime change in Iran and they’re doing that for domestic reasons because the Republicans have outflanked them a little bit. They said well we might have to engage in military actions. Obama doesn’t want to look soft but wants to change his policy. So here’s a way of saying same policy, tougher line. Great for domestic policy, not so great for dealing with Iran.”

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PARIS (AP) — French retailer Carrefour SA says its sales grew minimally in 2011, but that it expects to report losses of up to 20 percent for the year.

Europe’s largest retailer by sales has repeatedly lowered its profit expectations in recent months. On Thursday, it said its 2011 profits would likely be at the bottom of the last range it gave, losses between 15 and 20 percent.

The company posted euro91.5 billion ($117.4 billion) in sales last year, up 1.1 percent, driven largely by strong demand in Asia and Latin America as Europe’s debt crisis decimated consumption in Carrefour’s largest markets.

Carrefour says the rollout of its upmarket Carrefour Planet stores for 2012 would be “pragmatically reviewed” in light of economic conditions. The company hoped those stores would re-energize European sales.

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BEIJING (AP) — China’s economic growth slowed in the final quarter of 2011 to its lowest rate in 2 1/2 years as U.S. and European consumer demand plunged and Beijing fought inflation.

The world’s second-largest economy grew by 8.9 percent in the three months ending in December, data showed Tuesday. It was the slowest expansion since the second quarter of 2009, when the economy grew 7.9 percent.

For the full year, the economy grew 9.2 percent, down from 2010′s blistering 10.3 percent after communist leaders tightened lending and investment curbs to prevent overheating and inflation.

Hit by an abrupt plunge in Western consumer demand, regulators reversed course in late 2011 and tried to prop up growth by promising more bank lending to help struggling exporters and avert job losses and the threat of unrest.

Also in 2011, China’s urban population exceeded the number of rural dwellers for the first time, rising to 51.3 percent of the nation’s 1.3 billion people, the National Bureau of Statistics announced.

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It’s kind of a rough day to be LeBron James.

First, all everyone wants to talk about is his once again dormant state during the fourth quarter after last night’s loss to the Los Angeles Clippers. Then he gets reprimanded by his Twitter followers for a minor spelling mishap. And now he’s basically being told to play second fiddle to Dwyane Wade by one of his own teammates. Ouch!

That’s what Chris Bosh did in a recent interview with GQ (via The Basketball Jones).

GQ: Quick hypothetical, toes aside: Let’s say the game was tied. 10 seconds left. You had 30 points, LeBron’s got 30, and Wade’s got 30. You got the same amount of rebounds, same amount of assists—having the same great game. Who takes the shot at the end to either win or loose the game.
Chris Bosh: [immediately] Dwyane.

GQ: Why?
Chris Bosh: Because of his success in the past, given what he’s done. He’s a champ. He’s an MVP, and he’s hit a bunch of last-second shots. That’s the time you have to put pride aside a little bit, and do what’s best for the team. He’s quickest, and he’s gonna get a shot off. He relishes those moments.

Immediately comes up with “Dwyane” answer? Well, at least Bosh is in agreement with almost everyone else out there.

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Mortgage lender the Halifax claims that house prices fell by 1.3 per cent last year to an average of £160,063, their lowest level since July 2009.

According to the Halifax House Price Index, house prices fell 0.9 per cent in December, compared with the previous month.

Although prices rose in the third quarter of 2010, they fell by 0.1 per cent in the fourth quarter, offsetting the earlier quarter’s increase.

The bank expects prices to be stable throughout 2012 unless the economy falls into another recession.

The report contradicts earlier figures from Nationwide, which suggested that house prices rose by 1 per cent in 2011.

Property prices have plummeted since the onset of the credit crunch, with banks and building societies exercising extreme caution over lending, making mortgages very difficult to obtain, especially for first-time buyers.

Recent research by property valuation website Zoopla suggests that some regions have fared significantly better than others when it comes to property prices.

Zoopla recorded an overall fall in UK house prices last year, but an increase of nearly 7 per cent in Scotland, where the average house now costs £164,844.

Zoopla’s research suggests the average house price in Britain is now £221,331, significantly higher than the Halifax’s figure of £160,063.

According to Zoopla the average price in England fell 0.75 per cent in 2011, to £228,926, whilst the average price in Wales fell 0.1 per cent to £153,826, compared with 2010.

Zoopla also reported a widening of the north/south divide in England, with house prices rising in London and the south-east, but falling in the north.

It suggests the average house price in London, where demand for property is high, increased 2.3 per cent last year to £416,890, while prices fell 5.8 per cent in north-east England to £156,659.