“How exactly has Tim Cook fared in the five years since he has been the CEO of the world’s most profitable and valuable company?” Jay Somaney writes for Forbes. “Let’s start off with the most obvious criteria that CEO’s should be judged on which is the performance of the shares under his stewardship. On August 24, 2011, Apple shares closed at around $54 per share, adjusted for the stock split and dividends. Yesterday, the shares closed at $108.85 per share. At first look, one would think that was an outstanding performance considering shares have slightly more than doubled. However, the Nasdaq was trading at 2468, the day Tim Cook took over as CEO of Apple. The technology heavy index closed last night at 5260. So in the five years that Cook has been CEO of the company, the Nasdaq is up around 113% and Apple has returned 102%.”
“I am not even starting to compare Apple’s returns in the five-year period since Tim Cook took over as CEO with the companies run by Jeff Bezos, Reed Hastings, Mark Zuckerberg and the rest of mega capitalization tech land names, which make Apple’s returns look pretty pathetic,” Somaney writes. “In the hedge fund world that would be called not meeting one’s benchmarks and most hedge fund managers would be hard pressed to make the case for the annual performance fees from their investors. However, Tim Cook has made roughly $500 million or so in the five years despite lagging even the Nasdaq index. Only in corporate America does one get rewarded like a king for less than mediocre performance, no? So, as far as return to shareholders is concerned, I would give Tim Cook a C at best… Tim Cook’s overall grade for the first five years would be a C minus at best.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Tough grader from a real glass-half-empty kind of guy. During his first full fiscal year as Apple CEO, a 12-month period that ended September 29, 2012, Apple generated more than $156.5 billion in revenue and a $41.7 billion profit. During Apple’s last full fiscal year, Apple’s revenue hit $233.7 billion and company profits surged to $53.4 billion. In the last year, Apple under Cook generated more money than Procter & Gamble is worth and took in enough profit to buy Sony with $10 billion left over.
Earlier today, we gave Cook a solid B+ for his first five years.
SEE ALSO:
Rating Tim Cook’s first five years as Apple CEO – August 24, 2016
Apple CEO Cook has remained faithful to Steve Jobs’ legacy – now, can he transcend it? – August 23, 2016
Jim Cramer: Apple CEO Tim Cook ‘gets very little credit’ – August 23, 2016
Tim Cook: Five years as Apple’s CEO – August 22, 2016
Woz on Tim Cook’s first 5 years as Apple CEO: ‘I am very happy with the way Apple is going’ – August 19, 2016
