Possible, not probable

Steve Jobs’ 1973 job application just went up for sale at auction, and it’s a fascinating artifact. Per this BBC article, this job application was completed by Jobs three years before starting Apple. (as an aside, I know people like to collect everything under the sun, but I was unaware there is a market for this type of historical item)

Image source: Darren Rovell, X.com https://x.com/darrenrovell/status/2097735584974299395?s=20

The part that stood out:

When asked if he had access to transportation, he wrote “possible, but not probable.”

It’s a great line, both for the honesty it showed, but also for the truth that it conveys about so many things in life. There are many things that are possible, but fortunately or unfortunately, they’re not probable.

With regards to financial planning, we encourage our clients to not anchor to scenarios that are possible, but not probable:

• Overly optimistic: some people can get lost in overly optimistic scenarios for themselves, leading them to make poor financial decisions banking on outcomes that probably will never happen.

• Overly pessimistic: other people can get overly down about all the negative things that might happen. Sure, bad things do happen. But worrying and stressing about a bad thing that might happen is not a good use of time or energy.

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This is a good reminder to all of us to stay grounded and balanced with our outlook on life, because a lot of things are possible, but also not probable.

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Incredible statistic

Speaking of Steve Jobs and Apple, the company was in the news recently because Steve’s successor, Tim Cook, just stepped down at the end of August. He had taken over as CEO after Jobs in August 2011. The below chart is truly incredible. Apple was worth around $348 billion as a company on August 24, 2011 when Tim Cook took over. On his last day on August 31, 2026, it was worth $4.28 trillion. (that’s not a typo)

While Apple has many thousands of employees all contributing to the company’s success, it was a remarkable display of leadership for Cook to lead the company through that much growth.
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If you break down that growth over 15 years to a daily rate, Apple’s market value grew by around $780 million per day (on average), for the 5,486 days in his tenure as CEO. In 2011 when Tim Cook took over, if you had told him (or Apple’s board of directors) that the company would be worth $4.28 trillion when he retired, it wasn’t just improbable, it would have been hard to fathom.

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Thanks for reading,

Jack O'Connor, CFP®