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NASDAQ:AAPL
Continues to think this is a good company. Changed considerably from when he 1st purchased 7-8 years ago. The iPhone 6 is their newest product, but there are other things coming down the pipe, including the Apple watch, which he thinks will get more attention as it is launched. Also, ApplePay, which could redefine this company in the next 3-5 years. Trades at a very reasonable multiple of about 15X earnings. Ex-cash it would be considerably less than that. Still have about $150 billion cash globally. Since Steve Jobs, their capital allocation policy has changed dramatically and now they pay a very fine dividend as well as buying back a lot of stock. They buy back about 6% of the float per year. In China now and have just scratched the surface on their deal with China Mobile.
(A Top Pick Oct 14/14. Up 12.49%.) He is looking for about 20%-25% earnings growth for 2015. For 2015, we are probably going to see 20%-25% earnings growth year-over-year. The following year, it will probably be 10%-15%. A wildcard is how well the wearable category is going to do for them. Thinks there are some new categories coming. Yield of 1.7%.
This is maybe the year that Apple will peak out. The iPhone is 70% of their profits. They come out with imperfect products so that people will have a reason to upgrade. Samsung is always ahead of them. They held back on the larger screen and finally it came out in the iPhone 6, which will probably be the best selling product ever as it has the largest adoption rate. The next iPhone sales will not be as great. You might want to start getting out.
Don’t buy it at a record level. He has never owned it. One product almost generates 50% of their revenue and this bothers him. It is such a large company that at some point it will be harder and harder to grow. Thinks the Christmas season is already built into the stock price. The price may pull back at some point. Thinks they will not be able to innovate as much as people think.
Looking at technology, it has become a bifurcated market. Some of them are just getting smoked and some are struggling, and yet you see this one trading at a relatively low multiple. It really has the best ecosystem in technology. There are well over 50% margins on the iPhone. Don’t know what their sales are yet officially, but there are rumours they are in the 60 million+ already. He thinks it is certainly worth north of $150 a share. Yield of 1.58%.
Not as good a value today as it was 6 months or a year ago. Got to a point where it was priced for extinction. There was no premium built into the stock for innovation. There was a period of time when the capital allocation policy was really not a good one. A lot of that has changed. Also, they are now in China. The latest analysis says that they could do over 70 million units of the iPhone 6, a high-margin product. That will put their gross margin into the 40% range. At this price, it is trading at about 16X earnings, and if you net out the cash you are down into 13X. Still not expensive. Have a policy of capital allocation where they return to the shareholders the equivalent of about 8% of their market cap per year, both in dividends and buybacks. Feels the market is starting to recognize that this company can still innovate.
Apple (AAPL-Q) or General Electric (GE-N)? Two completely different plays in different segments of the market. This has had a great run recently. Thinks this has gone through a crisis period and came out very well. iPhone 6 is selling very well. Have a great brand recognition. He thinks people continue to underestimate and undervalue things like iTunes and the software in general.
A great company that has done incredibly well over the last little while. About 55% of their revenue comes from one product, the iPhone. With the bigger phone, it is going to eat away at the iPad business. The last thing they have been doing is financial engineering by buying back more shares, paying a bigger dividend, etc. The phone is really the thing that drives this company. It is probably more in a slow growth phase.