Apple (AAPL) Hits $600 Again

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Apple (AAPL) Hits $600 Again

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s share price shrugged off news of trouble with regulators in Italy and the low-key results of one of its Taiwanese suppliers, to again air-kiss the $600 price level today.

Up $6.49, or 1.10 percent, the stock just touched $600 and then retracted. It may be in course to take out its earlier high this year of $644 achieved in April. In March, when Apple first hit $600, analysts such as Morgan Stanley projected a price of $1,000 within twelve months.

The situation is not very much different today with Brian White of Topeka Capital Market setting a price target of $1,111 and reconfirming a Buy rating, even though the market is agog with chatter relating to the results of Wintek, Apple’s Taiwanese supplier of panels – whose June sales declined 34 percent compared to May, a massive decline considering that Wintek achieved an average m-o-m sales growth of 1 percent over the past many years. The market was extrapolating these figures to conclude that demand may be falling off for Apple’s iPad or iPhone products.

According to White, however, Wintek’s results may be explained by the fact that its supplies within the Apple system may have fallen off, having been replaced by some other supplier. This could, therefore be only a supplier churn, and not a sales problem for Apple products as thought of after Wintek’s results.

What’s the meaning of the $600 level?

It may look high but even at this level, Apple trades at a forward PE (fye Sep 24, 2013) of only 11.54 – which is not very expensive considering the company’s cash pile of over $100 billion, its brand equity, the vast number of innovative products rumored to be in the pipeline and its recent progress in patent litigation against major rival Samsung.

At the rate it is going, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) may achieve the hallowed trillion dollar market cap mark after all.

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