Apple Inc (AAPL)

Got Stopped out last spring. He is finding their equipment is getting a bit confusing. They are just minor user things, but they will work it out. He likes their latest IOS update a little bit better than the old one.

Just launched the iPhone 7, which has done a lot better than people expected. They are augmenting that with a growing services business. The real iteration is going to be the iPhone 8, where they are going to enhance battery power and will be a much better product. Trading at a reasonable valuation of 12.5X. They are flush with cash and are going to do something with that cash.

He is in the camp that at best, it’s OK. A fair value and a hold right now. The iPhone 7 sales will be okay, but it is falling. It will show some economic sensitivity. They got a big boost from Samsung’s phone blowing up, but that is short lived.

She is a fan of it and you could be buying it here. It has a lot of upside to go. It is a product company, not a product cycle. They can move forward without Steve Jobs. It is a good buying opportunity. She is watching the rumour mills of what they are doing in the auto industry. She thinks there is certainly a lot of innovation to come out of Apple.

He is almost out, having been in and out three times. Their days of growth are almost done. This is the year when iPhone sales were lower than the previous year. It should not be viewed as a growth stock, but as a return of capital stock.

In order for this to work well as an investment, historically it has been necessary for there to be a lot of pent-up demand for phones. Some of the subsequent launches of phones since iPhone 6, has been that not so many phones have been “end-of-life”. Thinks there has been a boost in the short term because of the difficulty that Samsung has been having. He wouldn’t expect volumes to be very strong on this. He would wait for more pent-up demand.

To him, this has sort of gone ex-growth, not growing as quickly. IPhone 7 is not substantially different, but was incrementally different. He likes the stock because it is cheap. They have lots of cash and can put it to work with a higher dividend. Their services business is growing quite rapidly, so he can see better numbers on that side. Dividend yield of 1.97%.

This is a great company. However, it has the law of big numbers working against it. In order to make any kind of significant move, it has to have stellar introductions and things really have to be on a large scale to get it to go. If he is right on his view of the market, then this stock will be going up.

iPhone 7 is not a big step up from iPhone 6. This is still a hardware selling consumer technology company, which condemns the multiple to not much more than the low teens. Still has a good balance sheet and a lot of money. They need to rejuvenate the growth by coming out with a new revolutionary product.

Owned this for a very long time, but started souring on it from a user perspective. Still loves their product. Every time he gets a new iPhone upgrade, it wasn’t as exciting as the last one. He finds their iTunes, iPhoto’s, all of that software and services used to be the easiest thing he had ever used, but now finds it the hardest. From a user perspective, they have some major work to do. Doesn’t understand why they haven’t snapped up things like Spotify, Netflix, etc. Probably one of the safest stocks out there right now.

Considers this as “yesterday’s stock”. The day Steve Jobs died, their creativity died as well. The company really hasn’t come up with anything new or exciting. It is more evolutionary than revolutionary. It has tons of cash and will probably raise its dividend.

He tells clients to find an exit. It is a great company but the return on capital peaked at 30%. It is down to 17% now. This is a material change. It is caused by competition. He sees it eroding over time. The iPhone 7 got a mediocre response.

A juggernaut. A name that is interesting and not expensive. There is always a lot of focus on product cycles and what is happening right now. However, if you step back and look at the company, they have a rock solid balance sheet. It has a very high margin services business that is growing behind the scenes, and that is becoming a larger part of the business. They are also getting more active in capital return, which at the right time, can make a lot of sense.

He needs three years of dividend history so he could own this. Tim Cook replaced Steve Jobs 5 years ago. It is the most valuable company in the world. The growth is slowing down however and it breaks a thirteen year streak. He would not buy in anticipation of the iPhone 7 release.

On this one you have to look at the valuation. It is very cheap and trading at 10X earnings. Thinks the bad news is all priced in, and you have to look forward to 2017-2018 when they have new phones. Hopefully they are spending all their money on R&D on new products and new ancillary devices and software that will grow their network.