GeorgeBMac

gatorguy said:

davidw said:

gatorguy said:

B-Mc-C said:

gatorguy said:

B-Mc-C said:

Xed said:

gatorguy said:

Xed said:

gatorguy said:

Xed said:

gatorguy said:

IMO actually distributing it to the stockholders in a special dividend would be more direct, assurance of truly getting something tangible instead of simply having faith it made your investment more valuable, but I guess they don't want to get hopes up of an ongoing thing. 

Buying back the stock is a clear indicator that Apple thinks the stock price is low and/or that they expect something to move the stock higher in the future to make the buyback a lucrative endeavor.

How would it be a "lucrative endeavor"? That would imply Apple could profit from a higher price later, which they won't. 

1. No one understands the health of the company better than its senior managers. No one is in a better position to judge what will happen to the future performance of the company. So if a company decides to buy back stock (i.e., decides to invest in its own stock), these managers must believe that the stock price is undervalued and will rise (or so most observers would believe).

Apple is not investing in its own stock tho. There is no retained value, the stock gets burned in effect. 

As far as these repurchases driving up the value of the remaining stock I perfectly understand the theory. The proof is lacking, therefore it's somewhat a leap of faith that you will benefit more from an increased share price later on directly due to a buyback this quarter compared to an identifiable and tangible check distributing those funds directly to you.

Sure they are. Retiring outstanding shares increases the value per share and increases EPS. Although, they never retire all the shares since they use some of these shares to issue to employees.

The real question for you and George is: Why do you think that the world's most valuable company and inarguably an incredibly successful, profitable, and savvy company does this if the net effect ranges from having no positive effect to harming the company? Could it be that those many thousands of brilliant people working in finance understand something you don't?

And yes @Xed you are also correct that AAPL does not retire all of the repurchased shares, saving some for issuance to employees. Those that do not believe this can review the quarterly SEC filings and/or listen to the conference calls.

Here's a better idea. Show us the link and statements that say the shares are not 100% retired after the Apple buyback. Hint: You won't find one. Xed is not correct and neither are you.

My suggestion is the same I gave @Xed : Before chastising someone else claiming they "don't get it" make sure you actually DO get it. In this case I don't think you do, so here's a helpful link to an informative article authored by a very reliable and trusted source explaining why it's NOT meant to increase Apple's stock price despite you being convinced otherwise. To some degree it might... or might not... but that's not the reason for the buybacks anyway if the source is to be believed.

Oh and by the way, Neil Cybart confirms my statement that every single Apple share repurchased is "burned" and no longer exists. 
https://www.aboveavalon.com/notes/2021/1/13/apple-won-the-share-buyback-debate

Great article! I’ve always loved Neil’s work. I don’t think you read it, because it proves my point. “In the process, a wealth transfer event is possible as ownership is shifted from shareholders willing to sell shares back to the company to those shareholders not selling shares.”

Like I said in my last post, I am done having lengthy educational sessions with people who either just want to bash my wildly successful investment in AAPL or who don’t understand terms like EPS, outstanding share count, RSUs, etc.

Have a wonderful week!

You should read it twice since you may have missed a couple points that would have cleared up some misunderstandings of yours. But if you want to go away making believe you were right all along, Apple keeps buyback shares to give to the execs,  and the program is intended to increase future stock prices then feel to do so. Life's too short not to live happy and content.

You too have a great week, sincerely. 

Here's a thought experiment.

So far Apple has repurchased over 5B shares of AAPL (split adjusted) with their buy back program, over the last 8 years. Apple now has about 16.5B shares outstanding. 

If Apple had not repurchased those over 5B shares, there would be 22B shares of AAPL outstanding today.  

Following me so far?

So if you want to think that Apple buy backs program had not help increase the share price of AAPL, then AAPL would still be at $145 a share today.  

Would that be your thinking?

One could reasonability argue that buying back shares every once in awhile, might not benefit future share price, even over the long term. But when a company buy back as much as Apple has bought back, over the last 8 years (and will continue to do so at the same or greater pace), no reasonable argument can be made that AAPL future share price did not and will not, benefit from buy backs.   

I've never believed, much less opined, that the buybacks had no positive effect at all. That final paragraph is more my thinking. That indicates we're more in agreement than you might have thought.

I believe there has been some undefinable effect on the stock price, but not a single person here can put a dollar number to it. It could be $100, $25, $5 even possible if unlikely it could be none at all and the price today would be just as high without them. That's also more along the lines of Neil Cybart's thinking as far as I can tell.  Raising the future stock price is not the goal, tho I would agree with anyone claiming it is a likely side-effect in the case of Apple. I might also agree there may be an identifiable cause and effect immediately surrounding each Apple buyback event, so temporarily bumping the price for those selling today is more likely, and I think you'll see Neil saying pretty much the same thing.

So here's a thought for you. An investor or manager controlling a huge number of Apple shares might benefit from selling when Apple is buying, then repurchasing at the price drop which inevitably happens. Maybe that's why the big guys like the buybacks. Truly I have no idea. I personally invest in tangible equipment, plant, and people rather than stocks. When those things go south I can usually understand why and if there was anything I could have done to prevent it. When they work it becomes a repeatable and dependable business plan within my control (for the most part) rather than at the whim of "the market" who may not have the same interests as me.

What I do not agree with is anyone claiming they know for a fact what the buyback effect on current and future stock price has been and will be and would challenge them to specifically define it if they find fault in that statement. It is entirely within the realm of possibility that you may get no more for your stock when you decide to sell than you would have had the buybacks never happened. Your faith that it will is what you have, and having faith is a wonderful and positive human trait, but that is not tangible proof you got your cut of the Apple cash.

A check is tangible proof.

EDIT: This is timely, an article discussing whether the stock market is operating on faith (there's that word) rather than tied to specific results.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/stock-market-records-rest-more-on-faith-than-corporate-profits-11626609277
If you don't have or want a WSJ subscription you can listen to the podcast:

laytech said:

Oh boy. Not sure this is a good idea. Competition doesn’t like it so they object and demand access to the technology. Something not right about that,

lkrupp said:

Anyone who is offended by anything has power these days. Funny

elijahg said:

red oak said:

Having consumers repair their own devices (or even change out battery) is a disaster in the making.   On multiple fronts:   safety, device damage, IP theft,  design changes to accommodate  (thicker, less waterproofing, screws), device reliability 

What is so hard about having Apple or certified center fix a device?     It really is not complicated 

You've obviously not read the article. As Mike says, there are long wait times which could be reduced by letting third parties repair their own devices. Also, as discussed ad nauseam, phones are nowhere near as dangerous as cars and anyone can repair a car. Device damage is down to the repairer, if I break my phone when repairing it I don't expect Apple to fix it. IP theft how? Nothing Apple does regarding repairability will stop IP theft. Considering devices can be repaired right now by Apple without "design changes to accommodate  (thicker, less waterproofing, screws), " there is no reason this has to change. Also not sure how reliability would change?

Literally every argument you've made against right to repair has zero actual bearing on right to repair.