I thinks there's a concerted effort by certain fund managers to manipulate the stock down in the short term, pile on, and make a killing, when AAPL blasts past $210 after next quarter. I expect to see $280 AAPL in 2010.
I like with my conspiracy theories with a nice big side of unsupported optimism. Do you serve beer with that? If so I'll be all in.
Well the old rule was buy Apple stock just after they announced at MacWorld. Investors read rumor sites are were always let down. Now since Apple is doing so well they believe Apple can't keep the profits going now since all the other manufactures are in the dumps. So buy Apple Stock about three weeks before their quarterly results meetings. The so-called Apple analysts have no clue on how Apple is really a well oiled company with a growing base.
I (as a long time Apple investor) have seen so-called analysts get Apple flatly wrong. I do 99% of what they say to do on Apple and have made a small killing in the last ten years. If you just watch college campuses to see today's youth adopting Macs left and right. Plus over half of them either have an iPhone or and iPod touch. Halo affect is in full force and Apple is hooking them (when they are young).
I see Apple in the near future between 15 & 25% of HOME USERS (not corporate yet though)! The old Mac user in me is sadden to see our close hard fought Mac community slipping away but the investor in me sees gold in Apple. They have ZERO dept and record profits. How many companies can boast that, at any time?
... Tim Cook showed he was more than capable of running Apple in Steve's absence & in fact I think with Steve retired Apple may even become much more price competitive.
You say that based on two quarters? It takes years for Apple to come up with new products.
Tim Cook showed he's good at operations, which we already knew. He can sure keep the trains running on time.
We have no reason whatsoever to think he is good at product design or has an interesting, much less unique, long-term vision. And those happen to be the key Apple competencies. Without them, Apple is nothing.
With the next gen iPhone not due out until around April 2010, some fairly innovative GPS based apps now appearing for Android, the improved spec of phones like the Droid (and forthcoming big screen HTC Android handsets) - and of course the fact Android is being scaled up to appear on larger devices, Apple will face a threat in the mobile cloud computing space by mid 2010 - unless they can answer back in time.
Not to mention Windows 7 that offers multitouch on the desktop and laptop today. No, it's not as polished, but it is available and application developers can exploit it. The iPhoto like app on the HP TouchSmart is a lot more fun to use than iPhoto for OS X.
Apple will do touch right on their next generation non iPhone hardware, and by then if they can leapfrog the competition, their stock will rise again!
That's the way the cookie crumbles.
The Apple response to this will be either multiple models or a more aggressive update cycle. The Droid and other upcoming offerings are well timed against Apple, since the iPhone is not expected to be updated until July. I would love for Apple to preempt this by releasing a new model by March (even if it is just another carrier).
The Droid will lose steam after a couple months (just like the Pre), and cease to be a major threat. Motorola and Verizon will then be forced to come up with new competitors and continue their cycle of diluting model share/mind share.
Windows Mobile is dead to the world. Microsoft is going to have to do a whole lot more to regain excitement in its platform, including lowering the cost and improving performance. It might not be an investment they are willing to do, at least not until it is too late.
Even a GooPhone will be a challenge to pull off serious competition for AAPL, because it requires constant effort to build up a new brand and keep it going. As the market expands, the iPhone will decrease in % control, but will still see unit growth. More competitors will enter, but it is unlikely for a new dominant player to arise as the market gets more established.
AAPL investors have very little to worry about over the next year or two. In all likelihood, we can say the same thing next year if history is any judge.
You say that based on two quarters? It takes years for Apple to come up with new products.
Tim Cook showed he's good at operations, which we already knew. He can sure keep the trains running on time.
We have no reason whatsoever to think he is good at product design or has an interesting, much less unique, long-term vision. And those happen to be the key Apple competencies. Without them, Apple is nothing.
Very astute observations.
I am a bit worried. One of Tim Cook's important 'achievements' -- if I am not mistaken -- was the China Unicom deal (for 5 million non-wifi phones), which can only be (mildly) described as an unmitigated disaster.
To be fair, Apples share price was around $170 before the stocks crashed last year. Since then Apple has only posted record profits. I think the stock should be fairly stable where it is, but I'm definitely not an expert.
It, along with the rest of the market, was far overpriced back then. It is so again today. While the stock may go up and down, over the long run Apple is not going to be a good investment because it is already worth so much. Only by going down can it have room to move upward. The sky is not the limit.
The two best pieces of advice I can offer, from years of hard experience:
Don't try to figure out short-term moves -- it will drive you insane.
Do not try to time buying and selling; it will make you poor.
Exactly. And the final piece of advice is, buy companies that are undervalued and unknown by the market, that's the only way to consistently outperform the average stock. Buying widely known and held stocks is a well known way to underperform.
I put my money where my mouth is. I got in AAPL @ 96 and I'm still long. I ain't selling!
No stock is a good investment forever, brother. They all go out of business eventually. Don't be the guy talking about how you bought and had a double, and watched it wilt away.
Stocks don't only get "manipulated" down - sometimes they get manipulated up as well. Anyone who has lived through a couple market cycles knows the pattern.
Exactly. And the final piece of advice is, buy companies that are undervalued and unknown by the market, that's the only way to consistently outperform the average stock. Buying widely known and held stocks is a well known way to underperform.
Actually, the people who really study this stuff, will tell you that the best way to beat the market is to never buy individual stocks and to never try to time the market.
Actually, the people who really study this stuff, will tell you that the best way to beat the market is to never buy individual stocks and to never try to time the market.
True, but that's looking at it from the other perspective. What I'm saying is that in hindsight, the best stocks tend to be the ones I described. But yes of course there's no way to know what those stocks are, so that's where your point comes in. But one thing is certain - one of the best ways to underperform and generally to lose money i'd to buy individual stocks that have performed well in the past. Those stocks historically are most likely to be the biggest losers.
Remember a few fundamentals that haven't been talked about in recent weeks. I'm not sure that non-GAAP iPhone subscription accounting has been fully factored into the stock price, and folks may have forgotten that AAPL may make the reporting switch as soon as with the release of results following the current quarter. Those may still have the potential to electrify investors when they show up as hard numbers on the quarterly statements. The numbers will also show the first partial-quarter impact of introducing the new iMacs. I'm guessing that YTY there'll be a significant uptick in iMac quarterly unit volume. That may also come as a positive market surprise in the upcoming results. While some other product lines like basic iPods may be tapering somewhat, we haven't heard of any product volumes that have completely fallen off the table. There's almost zero chance that the share price percentage gains of the last 12 months will even be approached in the next 12, but the reasonable price prevailing today could still yield a more than satisfactory gain in the coming year. In other words, now may be a buying opportunity so long as you're not unrealistic, greedy or impatient.
Remember a few fundamentals that haven't been talked about in recent weeks. I'm not sure that non-GAAP iPhone subscription accounting has been fully factored into the stock price, and folks may have forgotten that AAPL may make the reporting switch as soon as with the release of results following the current quarter. Those may still have the potential to electrify investors when they show up as hard numbers on the quarterly statements.
The market already knows about the accounting change - any effect there will be temporary and reversed inevitably. The rest is just conjecture about the future. It's a fool's pride to assume that he read about some big secret on a web site and the broader market doesn't know it yet. The more likely result is a typical "buy the rumor sell the news" situation, where once all the positives are into the stock and there is no more pending "good news" the stock finally deflates.
Apple is worth $171 billion. That's 6 times sales and 30 times profits. For how long can Apple grow profits at 30% or more to justify that? Companies at this size and this stage of growth go through a pretty predictable contraction of PE ratio as profit growth slows and the stock must trade sideways for years (anyone remember the hottest stocks of the 90s, Dell, Intel, MSFT?) to become fairly valued for a new growth plateau.
Good luck to anyone who has an outsized holding of such an expensive stock in a frothy market! You'll need it. Here's a tip - sell some covered calls to lock in some profits.
Last year, Apple reported incredible, blow out earnings. Stock ended up tanking to the 70s. If I had used it as a buying opportunity I'd be very well off. But I lost faith.
But I've been worrying this year.
Apple at this valuation has to show growth. Not just selling a bunch. They have to keep selling a bunch MORE than before.
Why will they sell more?
Bottom line, Apple has slowed down coming up with game changing new products. Eventually competitors are going to catch up unless Apple keeps moving the bar.
I don't understand why Apple dropped out of Macworld. Are we down to once a year new product announcements? The impact and anticipation is gone.
I know we all love to badmouth Android, but its evolving much faster than the iPhone and may become a real competitor soon. AT&T stinks as a carrier in the US. Android 2.0 has improved to be almost acceptable. Combined with Verizon, it may be a real challenge.
Most important question: What is Apple planning to improve the iPhone? Seems like they're sitting around once a year update cycle.
Lots of pressures on Apple and no rumors of upcoming game changing products. Why should Apple stock deserve such rich valuation?
It's mainly technical trading driven by the institutions. It can be very annoying on the downside of course, but if you're a small investor you have to accept that this the way it works unfortunately.
Lately I've been surprised that we still have not had another two-for-one split to bring it back to the $100 mark. It's such a good company and I wonder at what point it gets priced out of some fund managers portfolios.
Perhaps the "Google effect" at work?
And I'm still kicking myself for not buying more in February '04, when it hovered around $14.
A rather amazing story when you think about it. $14 to an effective $400 (due to the previous two-for-one split) in less than six years. I do believe that's the classic definition of a value stock becoming a pure growth play.
The two best pieces of advice I can offer, from years of hard experience:
Don't try to figure out short-term moves -- it will drive you insane.
Do not try to time buying and selling; it will make you poor.
Good advice, indeed.
Market timing is a great way to get fleeced. Few people realize that 85 to 90% of a portfolios performance (depending on what study you choose) is based on time in the market and effective rebalancing. In other words, buy and hold, returning your portfolios asset allocation, based upon your tolerance for risk, to its original percentages on a quarterly basis will get your where you want to go. Let all the fools chase the market on a daily basis. That's just fodder for the uneducated masses.
The other 10 to 15% is normally dependent upon your actual fund selections. Notice I said funds, as in mutual funds. There simply isn't any other way for someone with smaller amounts of capital to invest to achieve a well balanced and diversified portfolio. People blather on about fees this and fees that, but at the end of the day, show me another way to buy ONE ticker symbol and have, in effect, purchased positions in between 40 to 150 stocks or bonds.
Stock pickers that know what they are doing make much of their money off the people who don't know what they are doing. It is a net sum game.
Apple is the only stock I own, and it is the only exception I make in my portfolio. It was just too hard to resist at $14 per share. And I did sell some a few months after the last split.
One can get into any kind of logic about this, but there are way too many factors to guess correctly why a stock sells off!!!
How about this? Real story:
A friend of mine has been a huge Apple fan for years! His business is not doing well, and, as much as he hated to sell his beloved AAPL stock, he had to sell some! Why, cause that was his biggest and most profitable position in his portfolio. He couldn't make himself sell it @ $208, then he sold a small portion of his AAPL at $191 so he could pay some bills! His AAPL position within the entire portfolio was too big -- most of his eggs were in that AAPL basket, and still, he hated selling it, but then he realized that his business wasn't going to rebound quickly enough, so Sold a bit more at $201!
Throughout this whole episode, the friend drove me and our friends nuts! Otherwise he is a pretty normal guy - doesn't gamble, doesn't buy and sell stocks etc. I was amazed how attached he was to AAPL stock, as if he was married to it!!!
I bet he is not the only investor like that! So, it's not all big institutions! It's also a lot individual investors too, worldwide! So we can think logic [is it because of a law suit, because of yet another iPhone "killer", or whatever!], and try to guess, and we'll never know the answer!
BTW, some people try to break their selling in 2 parts, so to take a better advantage of their Capital Gains Tax, splitting it between 2009/2010! That's a factor too, among so many others! There is no one simple explanation as to why AAPL goes up and down, with the exception of maybe Steve Jobs health status. But, even then, that has been factored into the price, and Apple more than proved to the world that it will go on just fine! Of course it's more fun with Steve!!
Clearly, Apple has earned itself a huge loyal following, where people don't just buy their products, but their stock too! That is why AAPL will be just fine! Wish I had $$ to buy more myself, as I see more and more people who I know, who were totally into Dell etc. are switching to Macs! First it starts with kids and iPods, then kids and laptops, then parents! It's almost like a broken record! The younger folks are even more likely to lean towards Apple, cause it's cool.... The Apple stores are busy!
Comments
I thinks there's a concerted effort by certain fund managers to manipulate the stock down in the short term, pile on, and make a killing, when AAPL blasts past $210 after next quarter. I expect to see $280 AAPL in 2010.
I like with my conspiracy theories with a nice big side of unsupported optimism. Do you serve beer with that? If so I'll be all in.
I (as a long time Apple investor) have seen so-called analysts get Apple flatly wrong. I do 99% of what they say to do on Apple and have made a small killing in the last ten years. If you just watch college campuses to see today's youth adopting Macs left and right. Plus over half of them either have an iPhone or and iPod touch. Halo affect is in full force and Apple is hooking them (when they are young).
I see Apple in the near future between 15 & 25% of HOME USERS (not corporate yet though)! The old Mac user in me is sadden to see our close hard fought Mac community slipping away but the investor in me sees gold in Apple. They have ZERO dept and record profits. How many companies can boast that, at any time?
... Tim Cook showed he was more than capable of running Apple in Steve's absence & in fact I think with Steve retired Apple may even become much more price competitive.
You say that based on two quarters? It takes years for Apple to come up with new products.
Tim Cook showed he's good at operations, which we already knew. He can sure keep the trains running on time.
We have no reason whatsoever to think he is good at product design or has an interesting, much less unique, long-term vision. And those happen to be the key Apple competencies. Without them, Apple is nothing.
With the next gen iPhone not due out until around April 2010, some fairly innovative GPS based apps now appearing for Android, the improved spec of phones like the Droid (and forthcoming big screen HTC Android handsets) - and of course the fact Android is being scaled up to appear on larger devices, Apple will face a threat in the mobile cloud computing space by mid 2010 - unless they can answer back in time.
Not to mention Windows 7 that offers multitouch on the desktop and laptop today. No, it's not as polished, but it is available and application developers can exploit it. The iPhoto like app on the HP TouchSmart is a lot more fun to use than iPhoto for OS X.
Apple will do touch right on their next generation non iPhone hardware, and by then if they can leapfrog the competition, their stock will rise again!
That's the way the cookie crumbles.
The Apple response to this will be either multiple models or a more aggressive update cycle. The Droid and other upcoming offerings are well timed against Apple, since the iPhone is not expected to be updated until July. I would love for Apple to preempt this by releasing a new model by March (even if it is just another carrier).
The Droid will lose steam after a couple months (just like the Pre), and cease to be a major threat. Motorola and Verizon will then be forced to come up with new competitors and continue their cycle of diluting model share/mind share.
Windows Mobile is dead to the world. Microsoft is going to have to do a whole lot more to regain excitement in its platform, including lowering the cost and improving performance. It might not be an investment they are willing to do, at least not until it is too late.
Even a GooPhone will be a challenge to pull off serious competition for AAPL, because it requires constant effort to build up a new brand and keep it going. As the market expands, the iPhone will decrease in % control, but will still see unit growth. More competitors will enter, but it is unlikely for a new dominant player to arise as the market gets more established.
AAPL investors have very little to worry about over the next year or two. In all likelihood, we can say the same thing next year if history is any judge.
I like with my conspiracy theories with a nice big side of unsupported optimism. Do you serve beer with that? If so I'll be all in.
I put my money where my mouth is. I got in AAPL @ 96 and I'm still long. I ain't selling!
..... AAPL blasts past $210 after next quarter. I expect to see $280 AAPL in 2010.
I put my money where my mouth is.
You are predicting a 48% increase from today's price in 2010.
So, are you putting your money now where your mouth is?
You say that based on two quarters? It takes years for Apple to come up with new products.
Tim Cook showed he's good at operations, which we already knew. He can sure keep the trains running on time.
We have no reason whatsoever to think he is good at product design or has an interesting, much less unique, long-term vision. And those happen to be the key Apple competencies. Without them, Apple is nothing.
Very astute observations.
I am a bit worried. One of Tim Cook's important 'achievements' -- if I am not mistaken -- was the China Unicom deal (for 5 million non-wifi phones), which can only be (mildly) described as an unmitigated disaster.
To be fair, Apples share price was around $170 before the stocks crashed last year. Since then Apple has only posted record profits. I think the stock should be fairly stable where it is, but I'm definitely not an expert.
It, along with the rest of the market, was far overpriced back then. It is so again today. While the stock may go up and down, over the long run Apple is not going to be a good investment because it is already worth so much. Only by going down can it have room to move upward. The sky is not the limit.
The two best pieces of advice I can offer, from years of hard experience:
Don't try to figure out short-term moves -- it will drive you insane.
Do not try to time buying and selling; it will make you poor.
Exactly. And the final piece of advice is, buy companies that are undervalued and unknown by the market, that's the only way to consistently outperform the average stock. Buying widely known and held stocks is a well known way to underperform.
I put my money where my mouth is. I got in AAPL @ 96 and I'm still long. I ain't selling!
No stock is a good investment forever, brother. They all go out of business eventually. Don't be the guy talking about how you bought and had a double, and watched it wilt away.
Stocks don't only get "manipulated" down - sometimes they get manipulated up as well. Anyone who has lived through a couple market cycles knows the pattern.
I put my money where my mouth is. I got in AAPL @ 96 and I'm still long. I ain't selling!
I've been an AAPL investor for a lot longer than you, so I know better than to spout theories about what is going to happen, when, and why.
That's true.
However, I have posted it as a joke and also wanted you to make it 841
I still hope, and want to make a small contribution to my own hope.
Otherwise, I will just got, maybe in a year, almost no interest to apple at all. But for now - I want matte apple.
Well, as far as that goes, I want a matte Apple as well. Maybe I should go sign that thing.
Exactly. And the final piece of advice is, buy companies that are undervalued and unknown by the market, that's the only way to consistently outperform the average stock. Buying widely known and held stocks is a well known way to underperform.
Actually, the people who really study this stuff, will tell you that the best way to beat the market is to never buy individual stocks and to never try to time the market.
Actually, the people who really study this stuff, will tell you that the best way to beat the market is to never buy individual stocks and to never try to time the market.
True, but that's looking at it from the other perspective. What I'm saying is that in hindsight, the best stocks tend to be the ones I described. But yes of course there's no way to know what those stocks are, so that's where your point comes in. But one thing is certain - one of the best ways to underperform and generally to lose money i'd to buy individual stocks that have performed well in the past. Those stocks historically are most likely to be the biggest losers.
Remember a few fundamentals that haven't been talked about in recent weeks. I'm not sure that non-GAAP iPhone subscription accounting has been fully factored into the stock price, and folks may have forgotten that AAPL may make the reporting switch as soon as with the release of results following the current quarter. Those may still have the potential to electrify investors when they show up as hard numbers on the quarterly statements.
The market already knows about the accounting change - any effect there will be temporary and reversed inevitably. The rest is just conjecture about the future. It's a fool's pride to assume that he read about some big secret on a web site and the broader market doesn't know it yet. The more likely result is a typical "buy the rumor sell the news" situation, where once all the positives are into the stock and there is no more pending "good news" the stock finally deflates.
Apple is worth $171 billion. That's 6 times sales and 30 times profits. For how long can Apple grow profits at 30% or more to justify that? Companies at this size and this stage of growth go through a pretty predictable contraction of PE ratio as profit growth slows and the stock must trade sideways for years (anyone remember the hottest stocks of the 90s, Dell, Intel, MSFT?) to become fairly valued for a new growth plateau.
Good luck to anyone who has an outsized holding of such an expensive stock in a frothy market! You'll need it. Here's a tip - sell some covered calls to lock in some profits.
Last year, Apple reported incredible, blow out earnings. Stock ended up tanking to the 70s. If I had used it as a buying opportunity I'd be very well off. But I lost faith.
But I've been worrying this year.
Apple at this valuation has to show growth. Not just selling a bunch. They have to keep selling a bunch MORE than before.
Why will they sell more?
Bottom line, Apple has slowed down coming up with game changing new products. Eventually competitors are going to catch up unless Apple keeps moving the bar.
I don't understand why Apple dropped out of Macworld. Are we down to once a year new product announcements? The impact and anticipation is gone.
I know we all love to badmouth Android, but its evolving much faster than the iPhone and may become a real competitor soon. AT&T stinks as a carrier in the US. Android 2.0 has improved to be almost acceptable. Combined with Verizon, it may be a real challenge.
Most important question: What is Apple planning to improve the iPhone? Seems like they're sitting around once a year update cycle.
Lots of pressures on Apple and no rumors of upcoming game changing products. Why should Apple stock deserve such rich valuation?
It's mainly technical trading driven by the institutions. It can be very annoying on the downside of course, but if you're a small investor you have to accept that this the way it works unfortunately.
Lately I've been surprised that we still have not had another two-for-one split to bring it back to the $100 mark. It's such a good company and I wonder at what point it gets priced out of some fund managers portfolios.
Perhaps the "Google effect" at work?
And I'm still kicking myself for not buying more in February '04, when it hovered around $14.
A rather amazing story when you think about it. $14 to an effective $400 (due to the previous two-for-one split) in less than six years. I do believe that's the classic definition of a value stock becoming a pure growth play.
The two best pieces of advice I can offer, from years of hard experience:
Don't try to figure out short-term moves -- it will drive you insane.
Do not try to time buying and selling; it will make you poor.
Good advice, indeed.
Market timing is a great way to get fleeced. Few people realize that 85 to 90% of a portfolios performance (depending on what study you choose) is based on time in the market and effective rebalancing. In other words, buy and hold, returning your portfolios asset allocation, based upon your tolerance for risk, to its original percentages on a quarterly basis will get your where you want to go. Let all the fools chase the market on a daily basis. That's just fodder for the uneducated masses.
The other 10 to 15% is normally dependent upon your actual fund selections. Notice I said funds, as in mutual funds. There simply isn't any other way for someone with smaller amounts of capital to invest to achieve a well balanced and diversified portfolio. People blather on about fees this and fees that, but at the end of the day, show me another way to buy ONE ticker symbol and have, in effect, purchased positions in between 40 to 150 stocks or bonds.
Stock pickers that know what they are doing make much of their money off the people who don't know what they are doing. It is a net sum game.
Apple is the only stock I own, and it is the only exception I make in my portfolio. It was just too hard to resist at $14 per share. And I did sell some a few months after the last split.
How about this? Real story:
A friend of mine has been a huge Apple fan for years! His business is not doing well, and, as much as he hated to sell his beloved AAPL stock, he had to sell some! Why, cause that was his biggest and most profitable position in his portfolio. He couldn't make himself sell it @ $208, then he sold a small portion of his AAPL at $191 so he could pay some bills! His AAPL position within the entire portfolio was too big -- most of his eggs were in that AAPL basket, and still, he hated selling it, but then he realized that his business wasn't going to rebound quickly enough, so Sold a bit more at $201!
Throughout this whole episode, the friend drove me and our friends nuts! Otherwise he is a pretty normal guy - doesn't gamble, doesn't buy and sell stocks etc. I was amazed how attached he was to AAPL stock, as if he was married to it!!!
I bet he is not the only investor like that! So, it's not all big institutions! It's also a lot individual investors too, worldwide! So we can think logic [is it because of a law suit, because of yet another iPhone "killer", or whatever!], and try to guess, and we'll never know the answer!
BTW, some people try to break their selling in 2 parts, so to take a better advantage of their Capital Gains Tax, splitting it between 2009/2010! That's a factor too, among so many others! There is no one simple explanation as to why AAPL goes up and down, with the exception of maybe Steve Jobs health status. But, even then, that has been factored into the price, and Apple more than proved to the world that it will go on just fine! Of course it's more fun with Steve!
Clearly, Apple has earned itself a huge loyal following, where people don't just buy their products, but their stock too! That is why AAPL will be just fine! Wish I had $$ to buy more myself, as I see more and more people who I know, who were totally into Dell etc. are switching to Macs! First it starts with kids and iPods, then kids and laptops, then parents! It's almost like a broken record! The younger folks are even more likely to lean towards Apple, cause it's cool.... The Apple stores are busy!
So, again, I am totally not worried about AAPL...