Highlights from Apple's Preliminary Proxy Statement, 2014 Shareholders Meeting Proposals

[HELO server]

Carl Icahn is nothing more than a looter. Yes, in free market his strategy of buying stock, forcing a company too increase buyback to therefor raise the price of said stock, then selling it at higher prices is a fair game.

However, what about the implications of such buyback? To use $50 Billion, Apple would have to either:

• Go into debt
• Repatriate overseas cash

Both options which suck because they will leave Apple in a vulnerable position and without economic leverage to continue buying/acquiring valuable IP/infrastructure.

I've always been a keen supporter of keeping Wall Street out of Silicon Valley. If Wall St mongols what to play in Silicone Valley, they should invest and then just shut the f* up about running the company. The financial and engineering/electronics world are so much different. They know nothing of the latter.

Yes. He is executing a classical pump; to the letter.
1. Buy some stock quickly
2. Talk up the price any way you can
3. Convince others to buy stock, both to spike the price and to get someone to suck the dump.
4. Scam the suckers

He is at 3 now. If he is taking a dump on the suckers at 4, he cashes in.

Apple can avoid most of the harm to the stockholders and itself by selling stock now that Icahn has pumped the price. An added bonus is that it is financially wise to sell spiked stock for Apple. It may also dissuade scammers from trying it again.

 

[thekev]

You know, initially I thought you meant if he had a beard in his photo on his organ donor card.

No. It was a line from one of the Dos Equis commercials. I suspect you found that as a result of my prior post .

"His organ donor card includes his beard."

 

[chiefsilverback]

Which one is Icahn when he told Apple to buy back its shares when they were trading at $390 earlier this year? Apple's shareholders could have benefited to the tune of tens of billions if a bigger share buyback program had be instituted. Icahn was right. Apple's board was wrong. The cash pile continues to grow and be largely unused. Now the stock trades at $560 and the buyback opportunity is either gone or at least significantly missed.

Doesn't the fact that the stock increased ~40% without a buy back indicate that it wasn't needed? Yes it might have recovered faster, but this way the stock is up and Apple still have a big pot of cash...

 

[TallManNY]

Doesn't the fact that the stock increased ~40% without a buy back indicate that it wasn't needed? Yes it might have recovered faster, but this way the stock is up and Apple still have a big pot of cash...

No. The point, made by Icahn to Cook and by Warren Buffet to Jobs, is that when your company's stock is cheap sometimes the best thing you can do for your shareholders is to buy it back. That decreases the stock dilution for your shareholders. The 35% rise in the stock price is evidence that Icahn was right when he was jumping up and down screaming that it was cheap and Apple should buy. Instead Apple kept billions in cash and they earned their fairly typical 1% on those largely cash or cash equivalent investments.

Think about the sales this Christmas season. All these new products. All of them still priced at high margin levels. They just opened up the huge China Mobile market. Wow. There is a ton of cash coming in. They could have parted with 10 or 20 billion more in buy backs earlier this year and they would still have more cash on hand than any company other than Apple has ever carried. Who knows if a stock buyback is the right move now. I was adding to my Apple shares this year back when it was in the mid to low 400s. Now I'm just holding.

We don't know what the future will bring, but we do know that buying Apple stock at $400 earlier this year would have been a very nice investment. Apple missed the boat.

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Yes. He is executing a classical pump; to the letter.
1. Buy some stock quickly
2. Talk up the price any way you can
3. Convince others to buy stock, both to spike the price and to get someone to suck the dump.
4. Scam the suckers

He is at 3 now. If he is taking a dump on the suckers at 4, he cashes in.

Apple can avoid most of the harm to the stockholders and itself by selling stock now that Icahn has pumped the price. An added bonus is that it is financially wise to sell spiked stock for Apple. It may also dissuade scammers from trying it again.

Ugh. And what would Apple do with the proceeds from the sale of that stock? They would stick it in their cash pile and earn the typical yearly 1% return that they normally make from their cash investments. A return that is less than the rate of inflation. Well that would be a dismal move And yes it would certainly drive their stock price down quite dramatically.

 

[localman]

As a shareholder, I don't want Apple to give me cash. If I thought I could do something better with that cash than they could, I'd just sell my stock. I want them to dump that extra money into R&D on user interaction, testing and refinement of their products. Things that will multiply that cash. Draining it out just makes them weaker. That's the opposite of investing.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Why hell bent on an aggressive buyback? This will only serve the agenda of a select few how have large amounts of Appel stock, not you or me how have few of them.

I for one will vote no. For all I want is for this guy to scram out of Apple's shareholder list.

Not only did you fail to address the basic point, you also fail to understand that buybacks benefit all investors in the stock. A little rudimentary financial education is in order.

 

[jav6454]

Not only did you fail to address the basic point, you also fail to understand that buybacks benefit all investors in the stock. A little rudimentary financial education is in order.

A buyback is rudimentary method of just pumping your own agenda. Plain and simple. Icahn is just trying to raid coffers, plain and simple.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Apple becoming more conventional is exactly what I'm afraid of. A conventional company is bound by market mechanisms and people like Icahn are part of those mechanisms. Those market mechanisms push companies to avoid risk and therefore innovation speed is inevitably reduced. Which rarely is a good idea in the IT market...

Apple did not rise to its current market status due to conventional behavior, but because of bold and sometimes risky decisions. Whenever it was acting too "conventional", it eventually failed.


Stock exchange works mainly on the expectations of the investors. A big and increasing pile of cash doesn't necessarily require any further explanations - as long as good and innovative products are continuing to appear.

The best thing Steve could do was refusing to fulfill the expectations of conventional market elements, in order to stay as independent as possible. With Apple lacking critical mass, only that behavior allowed Apple to survive and prosper in a difficult and fast-changing industry. And if they want to stay ahead of the pack in the ever-changing IT market, they better not become any more conventional than they already have become over the last two years!

You are twisting my meaning. Conventional, as in terms of management and investor relations. Steve had a lot of important qualities, but he was far from perfect. Some of his methods and attitudes were quirky to say the least, and his explanation for the cash hoarding was frankly bizarre. It harms the company not at all to treat investors with something better than contempt, and arguably it benefits them in the long run. None of this has anything to do with innovation. That is a completely separate issue.

Of course, stock markets are driven by expectations, but you are wrong to say that stockpiling cash doesn't require an explanation. Stockpiling huge amounts cash naturally raises questions about the company's management, in particular what purpose is served by hoarding. Again, innovation is a separate issue. Apple already has orders of magnitude more cash than they need to develop new products. Growth does not come from stockpiling even more.

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A buyback is rudimentary method of just pumping your own agenda. Plain and simple. Icahn is just trying to raid coffers, plain and simple.

Wrong, plain and simple. Please, if you won't listen to me and others who have tried patiently to explain, find someone else who will. Investing without this kind of basic financial knowledge is at best counterproductive, and misleading others with patently incorrect statements is a disservice to everyone.

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As a shareholder, I don't want Apple to give me cash. If I thought I could do something better with that cash than they could, I'd just sell my stock. I want them to dump that extra money into R&D on user interaction, testing and refinement of their products. Things that will multiply that cash. Draining it out just makes them weaker. That's the opposite of investing.

Do yourself a favor: don't invest in stock.

 

[achbed]

I'm SHOCKED

This is the lowest legal type of pump and dump: I bought your stock so give me your company's money. The proper answer to this is: screw you. Shareholders like this are entirely focused on their own wallet. It's not Apple's fault he bought in on the peak - he's trying to make up for his basic investment mistake, and trying to use Apple's money to do it.

 

[lolkthxbai]

No. It was a line from one of the Dos Equis commercials. I suspect you found that as a result of my prior post .

"His organ donor card includes his beard."

Lmao! Yes, I remember now! The wording in those commercials are strange.

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You win.

 

[WardC]

Very simple: Buy $50B of Apple Stock...then negotiate with Apple...."I helped your company by buying so much stock, now you negotiate with me and do a buyback to inflate the stock price"

Step 2: Sell $50B of stock at $75B price

Result: Pocket $25B from talking Apple into the buyback.

 

[Bloomedis]

I will be voting no.

 

[gco212]

Carl Icahn is nothing more than a looter. Yes, in free market his strategy of buying stock, forcing a company too increase buyback to therefor raise the price of said stock, then selling it at higher prices is a fair game.

However, what about the implications of such buyback? To use $50 Billion, Apple would have to either:

• Go into debt
• Repatriate overseas cash

Both options which suck because they will leave Apple in a vulnerable position and without economic leverage to continue buying/acquiring valuable IP/infrastructure.

I've always been a keen supporter of keeping Wall Street out of Silicon Valley. If Wall St mongols what to play in Silicone Valley, they should invest and then just shut the f* up about running the company. The financial and engineering/electronics world are so much different. They know nothing of the latter.

Then Silicon Valley probably shouldn't have come to Wall Street. Be clear, Apple chose to go public, knowing full well the rules once they did. They came to Wall Street because they didn't have nearly enough money to become what they are now. It's not a one way street.

 

[N64]

Apple can avoid most of the harm to the stockholders and itself by selling stock now that Icahn has pumped the price. An added bonus is that it is financially wise to sell spiked stock for Apple. It may also dissuade scammers from trying it again.

Uhh... that sounds painful to the investors.

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This is the lowest legal type of pump and dump: I bought your stock so give me your company's money. The proper answer to this is: screw you. Shareholders like this are entirely focused on their own wallet. It's not Apple's fault he bought in on the peak - he's trying to make up for his basic investment mistake, and trying to use Apple's money to do it.

He didn't buy it on the peak. He has made significant gains on it. I think the first wave of his buying was when AAPL was still in the 400s. I still don't think the buyback is a good idea.

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As a shareholder, I don't want Apple to give me cash. If I thought I could do something better with that cash than they could, I'd just sell my stock. I want them to dump that extra money into R&D on user interaction, testing and refinement of their products. Things that will multiply that cash. Draining it out just makes them weaker. That's the opposite of investing.

So you still want them to give you cash... just more later, not less now. IMO the way to go with long-term investment is the S&P500, not AAPL (so 2000s)

I'm serious though. AAPL's peak was $700, when they had their amazing forecast with a really good hold of the market, when there were still plenty of features to add to the iPhone, and before anyone was making copies of their products that would even sell. It's not going back to $700.

 

[mikey1951]

You can see the GREED in this man's eyes

 

[imageWIS]

The reason why APPL has so much money to do a buy back is because they have huge profits but are not letting it reflect in their stock price (giving money back to the investors). They're saving the money for other types of investments...but no matter how much they innovate if they don't let their stock price increase, then they wont be able to attract new investors. We've seen this happen with the iphone 5s, Mac pro etc - barely any change in stock price. Investors expect to make money through growth of stock price - right now APPL is applying the growth elsewhere and share holders as well as customers are getting impatient.

What do consumers care about about the stock price??

 

[carmenodie]

Carl wants Apple to buy back the stock because he knows the markets wouldn't be able to shell out that money if lets ay Apple's stock hit $700.00 a share or what it is right now. Why do you think gates can't unload all his stock at one time? It would screw the markets up!!!!!
If you tried selling every outstanding share the price would drop fast! Why? It's a damn ponzi scheme. In a ponzi scheme only the people at the top of the pyramid can get more than they put into the hustle while the folks at the bottom get sh**!
But if Carl can get Apple to borrow $700 a share times the number of shares then it will work. And now you know why Carl says Apple's stock is undervalued. He keeps selling that bit of BS because he wants more per share. Duh!
So the price Apple will pay is being in debt tens of billions just so Carl can lock in the hustle with borrowed money. Period.

 

[Mytholas]

Did he get relief?

Is it me, or does Carl look like he just let out a good fart?

 

[velocityg4]

If Apple bought back 50.0000001% of it's stocks. Would that mean that the executives wouldn't have to ever listen to any of shareholders? Being as Apple has a majority stake in itself and the executives run it.

 

[jav6454]

Then Silicon Valley probably shouldn't have come to Wall Street. Be clear, Apple chose to go public, knowing full well the rules once they did. They came to Wall Street because they didn't have nearly enough money to become what they are now. It's not a one way street.

Ah yes, true. However, both founders explicitly expressed feelings for long term, not "pump and dump: investors.

 

[IJ Reilly]

If Apple bought back 50.0000001% of it's stocks. Would that mean that the executives wouldn't have to ever listen to any of shareholders? Being as Apple has a majority stake in itself and the executives run it.

No. A public company can't own voting shares in itself. Repurchased shares are effectively erased from the books. That is why buybacks are a benefit to shareholders.

Ah yes, true. However, both founders explicitly expressed feelings for long term, not "pump and dump: investors.

Possibly the most pointless and fact-free post in a thread full of pointless and fact-free posts.

 

[pmz]

Icahn is poison. Stay far, far away. Apple doesn't need your money. You just want Apple's.

 

[ElectroBricks]

Shut up already!

Shut the ******* up already Carl.
Nuff said!

 

[Fergo]

He's Mike from Twin Peaks...

 

[hpe]

alternative suggestion

Hi,

I'm a share holder too, a smaller one though.
How about Apple take 15,000,000,000 (much less than Carl suggests) and buys both AMD and Nvidia. Then we will see who can compete.

Is there a form I can send in for the share-holder meeting to put this forward?

Regards