Apple hits record high but leaves some investors in dust

SAN FRANCISCO - Apple shares cruised to a record-high close Monday, helping catapult the S&P 500 stock index over the $20 trillion mark in what amounts to a victory for plain-vanilla mutual funds over a bevy of hedge fund managers who recently backed away from the iPhone maker.

The largest component of the S&P 500 and a core holding on Wall Street, Apple's stock climbed 0.9 percent to end at $133.29, above its record high close of $133.00 hit on Feb. 23, 2015 and giving it a market value of about $699 billion.

Its increase helped balloon the S&P 500's market capitalization on Monday beyond $20 trillion for the first time.

While mutual funds have largely bet on Apple in recent months, some big names missed out on all or part of its recent acceleration.

Hedge fund manager Dan Loeb's Third Point LLC cut its stake in Apple by 26 percent to 1.9 million shares in the fourth quarter, according to regulatory filings, while George Soros and Carl Icahn also shed their Apple shares last year.

In contrast, the number of mutual funds reporting they became Apple shareholders in recent quarterly filings has jumped by 187 percent to 287, while the number of mutual funds liquidating their Apple holdings dropped by 26 percent to 151, according to Morningstar.

Among the big names who backed the stock, Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway last August said it had increased its stake in Apple by 55 percent to 15 million shares, now worth $2 billion. David Einhorn's hedge fund Greenlight Capital in January said it still likes Apple.

Apple has climbed 50 percent from lows in the first half of last year and is up 15 percent so far in 2017. It was still short of its all-time intraday high of $134.54, set on April 28, 2015.

Monday's gain came after Goldman Sachs analyst Simona Jankowski raised her price target for Apple to $150. She said she is more confident that an upcoming 10th anniversary iPhone will feature augmented-reality technology, which could help boost demand in a saturated smartphone market.

Many investors are betting that Apple will mark the iPhone's 10th anniversary with a dramatically improved model. They also believe that strong sales of the iPhone 6S two years ago have left a larger-than-normal base of customers ready to upgrade.

The Cupertino, California company reported strong December-quarter results on Jan. 31, and although it gave a cautious outlook for the current quarter, Wall Street expects revenue to grow this year after sinking nearly 8 percent in fiscal 2016.

In 1998, when the S&P 500 closed above $10 trillion for the first time, Apple accounted for just under 0.06 percent of the index. It now accounts for about 3.5 percent of the S&P 500, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.

The 721 days that have passed since Apple's previous record-high close represent the largest gap between such milestones since the iPhone's launch in 2007.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Amazon calls 2016 holiday season its best ever; shares rise

NEW YORK - Amazon.com Inc. said it shipped more than 1 billion items worldwide this holiday season, which the top online retailer called its best ever, and its shares rose 1.6 percent in afternoon trade.

The Amazon Echo home assistant and its smaller version, Echo Dot, topped the best-sellers list, said Jeff Wilke, chief executive of Amazon's worldwide consumer division, in a press release.

"Despite our best efforts and ramped-up production, we still had trouble keeping them in stock," he said.

Sales of voice-controlled Echo devices were nine times more than they were during last year's holiday season, the company said. Amazon did not disclose comparable sales figures from a year earlier.

"It's all relative to other numbers that they’ve never told us," said analyst Jan Dawson of Jackdaw Research.

Amazon likely sold between 4 million and 5 million devices this year to date with Alexa, the voice-controlled assistant on the Echo, estimated Morningstar analyst R.J. Hottovy in a research note. Shoppers can command the Echo to perform a host of tasks, from playing music to turning on Christmas lights.

"While Amazon's device sales are still relatively small growth drivers currently, we believe the proliferation of these devices will drive more ubiquitous use of Amazon services over time," said Baird Equity Research analyst Colin Sebastian in a note, pointing to customers ordering more items by speaking to the Echo.

More than 72 percent of Amazon's customers worldwide shopped through mobile devices, the company added, and Dec. 19 was the busiest shopping day this holiday season.

"Prime customers are spending twice as much as other consumers using Amazon and helping to fuel rapid revenue growth that few retailers with only a fraction of Amazon's revenues are able to generate," Retail Metrics President Ken Perkins wrote in a note last week.

Alexa and Amazon Dash, a one-button ordering service, are making it easier for shoppers to "skip the trip," and will put more pressure on rival retailers as they try to garner in-store and web traffic, Perkins said.

Other best sellers on Amazon included 72-pack Keurig K-Cups, the movie "Finding Dory," Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's Gear VR virtual reality headset and Nintendo Co Ltd's Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon role-playing video games, the company said.

Amazon shares rose $12.33, or 1.6 percent, trading at $772.92 at 1:58 p.m. EST (18:58 GMT).

source: news.abs-cbn.com