“Needham & Co.’s Charlie Wolf this morning raised his price target on Apple shares to $540 from $450, while reiterating a Buy rating on the stock,” Tiernan Ray reports for Barron’s.
“Wolf sees increased value in the iPad, especially, but also the Mac and iTunes since he last performed a valuation evaluation, if you will, on Apple, back in February,” Ray reports. “For example, the iPad business is now more valuable, in his view, because it ‘should capture a materially larger share of the tablet market than we previously forecast.'”
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Ray reports, “Wolf sees the Mac business more valuable based on the “halo” effect from the iPad, rather than the iPod, and after calculating the growth of app sales, he thinks iTunes is much more valuable than he’d estimated. Oh, and then there’s the nearly $80 billion in cash. That raised his valuation estimation as well. Wolf explains that his update to the iPad’s value reflects the failure of competing tablets. Like the iPod before it, he thinks the iPad will maintain a dominant share, even though he expects competing tablets to be brought to market for some time to come.”
Read more in the full article here.
At present:
Exxon Mobile market cap 364.58B
Apple market cap 349.28B
It may be superstition, but the idea of Apple being the largest company in the USA gives me the willies. They will become a target for government persecution, for instance.
It isn’t size that attracts attention, it is conduct.
Based on that criteria Google is in much greater danger of a DOJ inquiry than is Apple.
Apple is already a target for many governments, companies, organizations, and would-be profiteers.
Thanks, Needham. I own some AAPL and needlettuce.
Here’s what I view as a big concern for Apple competitors. Everyone knew the stand alone music player, iPod, was going to be cannibalized by music playing phones. The ipad or tablets In general will be multi functional devices in use for decades to come, and Apple is currently In a great position to continue leading the market…but Apple should never forget the device that made it a household name and helped set up the success of the ipad, the iPod (I still use my third gen iPod, looks like an antique)
On a day like today this kind upgrade is ignored. When investors get scared, the stocks they sell the hardest are those in which they have the most (or any) profit.
Let them panic or whatever. I am a very happy Apple shareholder and I will continue to buy more. Thanks Neeham.
I’m not a troll, but nowadays, Tech is NOT the sector to be in… this $500 thing may take a while… Ahem… the market is plumetting, despite a massive drop in Oil prices.
Investors are now focusing on European weakness, and check it out: $USD is bouncing back… that makes US exports more expensive.
It’s the flight of investors from Euros to US dollars that is creating the $ bounce. That will be quickly squelched when the cost of European production drops relative to US production, and buying shifts accordingly.
Currencies move according to a complex relationship between inflation, interest earned on sovereign debt, relative production costs and GDP. All are heavily influenced by governmental spending and debt creation. Too much spending creates artificial inflation (not caused by market supply/demand forces) and too much debt creation relative to GDP.
Buy AAPL long!!