Any reasons that you guys got in before the earnings announcement?

I bought a little more too. No real reason aside from the fact that i thought it was a good buy at $450, and nothing has changed since then.

I am a noob though, no question.

I'm not an expert but have a degree in finance which means nothing really but I get the feeling that APPL is affected more by emotion then most other stocks on the market.

I probably wouldn't buy until after the earnings. Is anyone looking at writing some calls or buying puts on it right now?

Not without a gun to my head

I posted this in the trading thread some days ago and want to post it here as well for those who don't read it but follow Apple. Perhaps some will have insights before earnings on Tuesday. The data is from statcounter, which is a widely used hit counter put in web pages and gets the data from 15 billion page views. So it measures, accurately, the browser activity of various phones and desktops. Absolute market share is irrelevant from this due to the way people use their phones, but increases or decreases do tell you something.

You can look up further stat breakdowns here: http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_os...-201211-201304

Asia is a big part of the increase I think - they went from 7.5% to 10.5% market share there since December. It might give the market big hope for growth if those numbers are correct.

I've bought a trivial couple of grand of $500 Apple June calls on this information, but I'm not willing to get in for more given the multiple rumors of poor sales and supply chain cuts. It's also just market share data and we don't know the breakdown of profits, which could be poor. But I think it's an interesting data point given that they've been flat for two years. Does anyone follow this stuff and have an insight?

Apple is the most ridiculously mispriced megacap stock ever possible. Lets do some quick maths. $366B market cap, probably up to $150b in cash, last year earned 50b, ex cash trades at a 4 p/e. Even if apple loses half its earnings its selling for an 8 pe. 3/4 of their earnings 16 pe. You get the point. Is that really possible? I love my apple products, and i'm sure many of you do too or at least have friends who do. And they are clearly the best tablet maker, which is the future of personal computing.

A stock trading at a quarter of the markets multiple, a leader in its industry, earns insane margins(granted which are due to drop), so earnings go to 25b in 3 years slap a 12 multiple on that (apple probably really deserves higher), they earn 80b over next two years, 300b+150b+80b=530B

and thats in a disaster scenario, what if they continue to kill it? even in the worst case they are worth 47% more in intrinsic value...the best case? lets just leave that as a free option Most mispriced megacap EVER.

NOTE: For poker players interested in finance, who under stand EV terms think of it this way:
(50%) $530B+ 30% (700B) +10% (800B)+ 5% (1T)+ 5% (1.5 T)=690B or $737 a share, you can come up with your own estimates based on scenarios you think could play out, I'd love to hear thoughts.

Disclaimer: I and funds I manage for other investors are long apple. Price target $1200 a share long term, will sell half of position at $720 will probably be a leader near the end of year once sentiment turns around and they release apple tv or apple watch.

Cool post truth. Also I'm assuming Android's usage is so high because they give their operating system away to so many vendors, but I'd like to know more about the puplic opinion of whether people actually "like" android's system. For me personally, I've used it and found it difficult, and I wondered if the general opinion was similar.

it might be a contender for most undervalued megacap ever, but it's not even close to the most mispriced ever.

Why is there a line for "Samsung". Doesn't Samsung run on the droid os?

The higher end smartphones do, but Samsung also has feature phones similar to Nokia's which run on a proprietary OS (Bada). They're popular in the poorer parts of the world although Nokia dominates this space. They're a lot cheaper than smartphones and not very profitable compared to smartphones given that they're fighting for the very low end dollars.

a sizeable portion of Android device sales are high-end, flagship devices that cost equal or more than (e.g. Note 2) the newest iPhone. Given the breakdown of iPhone sales by model (5 vs 4S vs 4) last quarter, I wouldn't be surprised if the number of highend Android phones sold is about the same as the number of iPhone 5s that are sold.

All that to say, there are *plenty* of people who like and prefer Android's system (see the thread on OOT for example) over the other available options (I mean there are even people who prefer WP over Android and iOS ...). Android's massive market share *is* primarily because of cheaper commodity devices, but even without those Android is still probably the #1 smartphone OS by marketshare (and if not, a very close #2).

This sentiment is probably also easier to see outside of the US. The US is very trendy and cultish, and often purchasing trends are dictated by that (but despite all of that Android is doing "OK" in the US.)

I don't really follow aapl but have taken the mandatory trade on tomorrow's earnings by buying calls. I wanted to ask what is the exact amount of cash and do they release info on how it's managed (ie r they in deposits, treasuries or just in current accounts and with what banks do they deal with) thanks

I'm not going to opine on whether AAPL is underpriced - though my analysis from earlier (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...&postcount=265) seems even more relevant now. But either way, this line of thinking is why a lot of investors lose money.

No company, especially not a proud, iconic company with a huge legacy to live up to is going to be run with an eye towards saving a few petty dollars for its shareholders. The chance is that if there's a war for market dominance and Apple is on the losing end, Apple isn't going to return cash to the shareholders or downsize to a niche in which it can be competitive and fight for another day. It's going to risk massive losses to prove itself, its vision and its past. In the worst cases, various divisions will fight for the right to lose more money. In such circumstances, cash doesn't belong to you, especially when the company is too big for any investor to take over and too delicate for outsiders to run.

It's like random Japanese people at the beginning of World War II thinking, what's the worst that could happen, we give up some pacific islands we invaded and go back to being a dominant Pan-Asian empire with a huge military clout over the rest of Asia.

I've also explained this before, but unlike Microsoft or Google, Apple has no stable stream of revenue to count upon that's protected by a monopoly or a monopoly-like market dominance. Very few people are meaningfully locked into Apple products, nor do they have substantial edge over others in terms of technology and infrastructure (as is the case for many of Google's and Microsoft's products). In this sense, they are much more comparable to Nokia, RIMM, Nintendo and Sony than Google, Microsoft, Oracle and IBM. A couple of bad product cycles can easily destroy the underlying profitability.

I think that's not entirely true. Musicians, graphic designers, and posers are all fairly locked into $2000+ laptops from Apple. In many cases because it's the best product for their work. In other instances it's because a $2000 laptop is cool (and that never changes to many). That part of the market will never die, not as long as Mac's get less viruses, and generally function better in the graphics space. But I have no idea what that represents, market-share wise.

That's a valid point, but unfortunately Apple's biggest profit-drivers are not their Mac computers. In the scheme of things notebook and desktop sales are are a small part of Apple's business.

Next to **** all. Windows has 92% market share despite the huge rise of iOS since 2007 and a whole generation becoming familiar with mainstream Apple products. Macs are nothing. Apple have only ever created one device to justify anywhere near their market cap - the iPhone. The iPad are going to go the way of the dinosaur, Microsoft has finally done the smart thing and Windows is going to be available on all form factors (4:3, 16:9), sizes and prices of tablet in the coming months which will destroy the iPad and tablet Android too eventually. So Apple are left with being an iPhone company and whatever else they can come up with that can sell 40 million units a quarter at 35% profit margin without subsidy.

Anecdotal but convincing evidence, to me at least, is the young people I've met have trouble navigating Windows 8's touch/metro interface.

That alone will prevent mass adoption of Windows tablets in the near future. Never mind MSFT is rather short on the "cool" factor. People knew this before Windows 8 went retail. The sales and adoption rates since confirm what people suspected: Windows 8 is not ready. It's not ready to fight in mobile space due to unintuitive UI.

That said, I do believe MSFT will pull another MSFT: they'll get it done right the second time around. I look forward to the next generation of Windows 8 tablets and convertible ultrabooks.

microsoft has given no indication that they'll be able to grab a significant chunk of the tablet market share. maybe they will eventually, but its laughable to act like they're a lock to destroy the ipad and android tablets.

Yeah I agree. They're not even a lock to succeed in that space much less destroy.

Also assumes that Apple and whoever else just stands still and does nothing but watch. There's no certainty that Apple will forever be unwilling to come off their margin requirements and/or produce more price-accessible products. They may have no choice but to take smaller margins anyway. It wasn't too long ago that Apple (or maybe just Steve Jobs) hated the idea of a smaller iPad form factor but they made one of those. Now they're finally working a cheaper iPhone.

And that's just Apple. There's still Android-device manufacturers and other OS's to consider. Google, Samsung, Amazon and who knows who else are also players I won't be amazed at all to see other OS's enter the mobile market.

This just isn't the classic home computer segment where it's been the Windows juggernaut with the occasional OSX or Linux user here and there. Where computer users might be somewhat vested in Windows, that dynamic doesn't exist in the tablet or phone space. Maybe crossover tablets a little because of interest in MS Office, but that's about it. And for the time being I don't see Office helping Windows Phone at all.

Windows 8 works fine by the way, but MS designed it for themselves. Most seem to really dislike the interface(s) which is what I figured a year ago. Had MS actually listened to the feedback beta users overwhelmingly gave them, they'd have had a much better reception. Now rumor is 8.1/Blue will put in a Start button but have no menu - it would just lead to Metro. Which at this point would be Steve Jobs-level arrogant not to mention insanely stupid.

Add to that they seemed a little confused. The point of the changes in 8 was to make it one OS for everything, yet they throw out that ridiculous RT and Phone 8. I don't think either the computer OS or RT did the Windows brand name any favors. It's not like customers shopping for phone and tablets are only going to remember their good Windows experiences and forget the bad.

as a pure technical trader, based on pattern recognition, this zone from 387-394 is one of the most beautiful patterns I've seen in my 3 years of trading. You have a giant ABCD down to 394-5 from the 700 highs, then two more smaller (but still very large) ABCDs into the area, and a perfect 1.618 expansion from the last month or so to the exact lows on friday.

It could not be more oversold and the news event at the end of the day sets up amazing potential. You can see several other long-term ABCDs that worked incredibly well in Apple. Here you have three, plus the 1.618 fib, plus another huge .50 fib from some very old lows.

It's a nut buy spot here. I was in at 387 and out at the close yesterday. I also am long some 450 June calls. I'm looking for any decent pullback to get back in.

note: I could not care less about the fundamentals, but I would assume even just a meh earning report would mean a boom, based on these patterns.

Pics would be awesome if you don't mind. Id love to understand what your referring to more.


Also, gl to everyone today. In for a smallish amount at 399.

Adding this here because I think so many people see this or will see this as undervalued. Let go of MU and not carrying anything else, don't see anything I like better atm. Don't plan on holding all that long though, it's for more than I like having in one stock but w/e. If it goes back my next place will have to wait a little longer to build a deck or something. 404

good luck everyone. 5 minutes until show time.

19.5 million iPads and 37.4 million iPhones in Q2. Doesn't seem like a lot globally (looks like it's more than this time last year)

Dividend increase and pretty big share buy-back. Should be interesting when this stops being halted.