Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) Board of Directors Approves Stock Repurchase Plan

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Thursday, May 2nd, RTT News reports. The company plans to repurchase $110.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the iPhone maker to reacquire up to 3.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Apple Price Performance

Apple stock traded up $10.35 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $183.38. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 163,110,196 shares, compared to its average volume of 62,045,676. The company has a quick ratio of 1.02, a current ratio of 1.07 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.83 trillion, a P/E ratio of 28.56, a P/E/G ratio of 2.05 and a beta of 1.26. Apple has a twelve month low of $164.07 and a twelve month high of $199.62. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $172.15 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $181.57.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The iPhone maker reported $1.53 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.51 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $90.75 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $90.37 billion. Apple had a net margin of 26.16% and a return on equity of 156.04%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 4.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.52 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that Apple will post 6.53 earnings per share for the current year.

Apple Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 16th. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 13th will be given a $0.25 dividend. This is a positive change from Apple’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.24. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 10th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.55%. Apple’s payout ratio is 14.95%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on AAPL shares. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $250.00 target price on shares of Apple in a research note on Friday. Canaccord Genuity Group upped their target price on shares of Apple from $200.00 to $215.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. DZ Bank restated a “hold” rating and issued a $180.00 target price on shares of Apple in a research note on Thursday, March 28th. Itau BBA Securities raised shares of Apple from an “underperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $162.00 to $188.00 in a report on Friday. Finally, Barclays raised their target price on shares of Apple from $158.00 to $164.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Friday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, thirteen have assigned a hold rating, twenty-two have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $203.72.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, COO Jeffrey E. Williams sold 59,162 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $172.22, for a total value of $10,188,879.64. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 489,944 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $84,378,155.68. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other Apple news, Director Arthur D. Levinson sold 100,000 shares of Apple stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $180.94, for a total transaction of $18,094,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 4,434,576 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $802,392,181.44. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, COO Jeffrey E. Williams sold 59,162 shares of Apple stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $172.22, for a total transaction of $10,188,879.64. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 489,944 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $84,378,155.68. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 366,271 shares of company stock worth $63,653,887. 0.06% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Apple Company Profile

Apple Inc designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables, and accessories worldwide. The company offers iPhone, a line of smartphones; Mac, a line of personal computers; iPad, a line of multi-purpose tablets; and wearables, home, and accessories comprising AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod.