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Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) is ticking lower early following a downgrade by Credit Agricole from Buy to Outperform.
Shares of Apple, along with management, have been pressured lately due to speculation it might be switching into a lower-margin segment with a cheaper smartphone sometime in 2013. With the company having something along the lines of $140 billion in cash, investors are clamoring for larger shareholder returns with growth slowing. Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn has been a proponent of this, issuing a plan for Apple to pay a dividend via its preferred share segment recently. No announcement was made by Apple on a new buyback program or dividend adjustment at its recent annual meeting.
Despite the lack of clarity, one noted money manager sees investors getting some good news in April. Gamco’s Howard Ward commented on Bloomberg TV Monday that Apple might introduce a new capital reallocation plan for its cash next month. Ward believes Apple is currently engineering the plan out right now. He didn’t mention specific ideas of what sort of reallocation Apple might try.
With Apple down 18.4 percent on the year, now may be as good a time as any to retry Apple into any sort of announcement.
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