Apple shares go their own way
Something interesting happened to Apple’s share price at about 3:45 p.m. Thursday, just as the bottom was falling out of the rest of the market — leaving the Dow down 679 points (7.3%) for the day.
That’s when Apple (AAPL) reversed course and started moving up.
The trend continued early Friday morning. Even as the Dow fell another 600 points in first few minutes of trading, Apple was enjoying its own private rally. In mid-morning trading, Apple was up nearly 8 points (9%) while the Dow was still deep in the red.
It closed the day at 96.8, up 8.06 (9%), while the Dow ended down 128 points (-1.5%).
The divergence is even clearer when you compare Apple’s performance with the NASDAQ (see chart.) There’s no telling how long this will last, but for the moment, Apple’s shares seem to be going their own way.
Why is this happening now? There was nothing in Friday’s analysts’ reports to explain it; indeed, Oppenheimer & Co. chose Friday morning to lower its target for Apple, to $145 from $213. And for now, none of the other four horsemen of technology — Google (GOOG), Amazon (AMZN) and RIM (RIMM) — are following Apple’s lead. (See Market free fall: How Apple fared.)
What’s more likely is that Apple may have finally hit some kind of bottom — around $86 a share, a 20-month low — focusing investor attention on what’s coming in the weeks ahead: 1) a new line of high-margin notebook computers scheduled to be unveiled Oct. 14 and 2) a quarterly earnings report on Oct. 21 that are widely expected to blow past Apple’s guidance numbers.
Given the volatility of this stock, however, the trend is unlikely to last for long. The next bit of bad news for Apple is likely to come directly from CFO Peter Oppenheimer (no relation) in the company’s Oct. 21 conference call. Given the level of consumer confidence going into the holiday selling season, Apple’s Q1 guidance — always conservative — is sure to be even more chilling than usual.
typo:
“are following Apple’s lede.”
ex ped: Old journalist’s habit. Fixed now.
It happened because the $800 laptop rumors leaked around that time yesterday.
Any objective analysis of products, services, trends, and media penetration in the computer industry points at Apple as the one true ‘horse’ to lead us out of this mess.
Apple is historically undervalued. This market could actually help them.
After all, if you held your Apple stock more than 2 years, you are STILL ahead, even in THIS market.
“’Apple is doomed & business is dead’
What a stupid comment.”
I’m pretty he was using Sarcasm™
Apple is still a winner. Market, economy, etc be damned…I want another iPod Touch or iPhone. (Note: I use my wifes and that simply won’t do)
Anyone who touches one since the 2.1 firmware release will agree….the only problem….I can’t have more apps installed!
I am very close to buying Apple again! The fundamentals are very strong despite the pending economic disasters.
http://directory.stocksbuyorsell.com
“Apple is doomed & business is dead”
What a stupid comment.
Is the author honestly too stupid to know that the new Macbook event was announced yesterday to take place on 10/14?
It was announced Thursday afternoon, and their price went up. It’s not rocket science.
Do some research, geez.
ex ped: The author doesn’t claim to be a genius, but he did suggest that the Oct. 14 “The spotlight turns to notebooks” event may have been a factor in the turnaround.
For the record, Greg, Apple sent out the press invitations at noon and the stock fell pretty steadily for the next three and a half hours — down roughly 5.5% — before reversing direction.
Oppenheimer is the CFO not COO.
ex ped: Arrrgh. I knew that. Fixed now. Thanks.
I don’t know, maybe someone found value, or maybe its just being held up so some additional big boys can get out until next week to sell the news.
At 90 a share $23 in cash, the stock is valued less then 70 bucks. Is it a good value, is it a bad value who knows, can you tell me what’s a good value for Apple???
Obviously consumers will stop buying their products and go back to buying what, Zunes? ZunePhones? Storm? G1? Apple is doomed, business is dead.
Oppenheimer will kill the stock even more, it will go to zero. OOOO, DOOOM, GLOOOM.
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Silicon Valley veterans like to joke that Steve Jobs must be surrounded by a reality distortion field; if you get too close to him, you start to believe what he's saying. Thanks to the success of the iPod, the launch of the iPhone and the renewed interest in the Mac, Apple has made believers out of millions of customers - and made a lot of investors rich. But Philip Elmer-DeWitt believes that an ounce of skepticism never hurts when writing about the company. He should know. He's been covering Apple - and watching Steve Jobs operate - since 1982, first for Time Magazine, then for Business 2.0, and now for Fortune.
Based on all other reports I’ve been reading, the new laptops are expected to begin pricing at around $799. This is actually a positive for Apple’s stock as it will allow them to compete in the sub-$1000 laptop market. The reason this is even bigger news today than it was a month ago, is because the lower price market is going to be 95 % of sales with the economy headed down. Investors are looking forward to Tuesday’s announcement. Low Price laptops that will sell in high volume at BestBuy.