apple ceo tim cook set to speak in about a half an hour from now. what is the need for apple stock.n industry can be a tough act to follow, but at xerox we've embraced a new role. working behind the scenes to provide companies with services... like helping hr departments manage benefits and pensions for over 11 million employees. reducing document costs by up to 30%... and processing $421 billion dollars in accounts payables each year. helping thousands of companies simplify how work gets done. how's that for an encore? with xerox, you're ready for real business. today is gonna be an himportant day for us.re? you ready? we wanna be our brother's keeper. what's number two we wanna do? bring it up to 90 decatherms. how bout ya, joe? let's go ahead and bring it online. attention on site, attention on site. now starting unit nine. some of the world's cleanest gas turbines are now powering some of america's biggest cities. siemens. answers. >>> only 25 minutes before tim cook addresses the goldman sachs technology conference. we'll break down what we can expect to hear from cook and what

>> apple actually. >> apple? >> apple calls.ed by this iron horn stu einhorn stuff. i think there's potential for an event here. >> and dr. j? >> also apple. i spoke with karen finerman this morning. >> yes. >> and because i listen to what mr. einhorn said and the stock opened in the pre-market right when you guys were talking about it, the stock ran to $4$466, pulled to $454. when it opened, i sold puts like crazy. the stock ripped all the way to close nearly $470 and i think if we get another close over $465, that critical area that we've been talking about, then i this i the stock does go a lot higher, into that conference next week. goldman sachs conference with tim cook speaking. >> this is a short-term trade or that a bottom has been put in the stock? >> again, without taking too much of what karen's going to address, i think there are a bunch of problems with apple not addressing this in 2012. when, if they were going to give us a special dividend, that was the time to do it. share buy-backs and preferred, yes, they can d

apple trades at 6 times x cash. the market trades bat 12 times earnings, so it is a reasonable multiple to get to that valuation. >> brian, how do you think this whole thing will play out. as we mentioned there is a shareholder vote on february 27th. you know, what happens at that meeting and what happens to this whole debate and lawsuit. >> so you know you may not necessarily, number one i think you'll see a lot of shareholder activism. a lot more discussion, i think, about the cash ballot. you may not necessarily see something right away. but i think shortly there after i think you know something will be done. whether it's an increase in the dividend, an increase in the buyback, or some type of preferred stock with a high dividend that david einhorn's proposing. any of those make a lot of sense. i think david has brought this discussion to the next level and something's gok done very, very soon about this. >> all right, very interesting. we'll see what happens. brian, thanks a lot. i know that you are recommending

good as apple. could be more critical of the performance of thousands of other stocks and thousands of other managements than i would have before i would pick a fight with apple. that's why i think that why einhorn can question what they're doing with their cash, i think this is wrong headed move. as apple explained in a statement today, the company is in the midst of a colossal three year plan to return billions to its shareholders. that's hardly chump change. i think apple has the right to hold the cash that it has. this is a high quality problem to say the least. a total victim of success issue that can be solved by apple raising its own dividend very nicely and not creating a whole new class of preferred to do so, convoluted rube goldberg like. apple, through its own success has been able to accumulate that cash flow more rapidly than anyone including einhorn thought was possible. my understanding from this afternoon statement is that apple is totally open to doing just that, but i'm mindful tha

jb, what's apple worth? >> what's apple worth? at the moment, mid $400. i think the way to look at apple is that this is a stock that a lot of the hardcore traders have actually abandoned. things seem to be quieting down, volatility seems to be quieting down. if you're a trader, if you're someone looking for that higher beta, multipoint move, you probably move on, this stock just has not been delivering that type of action on a day to day buy sis. we're finding that equilibrium between value investors and the premium. >> virtual dr. j, what's your thought on apple? >> i thought that a lot of folks would be taking advantage of the losses that they have got, that's something none of us want, but when you have them you take them and you have to wait 30 days to get back in to avoid the watched sale rule. it's between a couple of technical levels that it needs to break for me above $462 and hold it foor 24 hours. >> the real tell on apple seemed to be on friday when we pushed past 14,000 for the first time since '07 and afteral traded miserably today. >> if yo

the stock market got no help today from technology giant apple, apple shares slipped about one percent after investors were disappointed nothing concrete came out of the company's annual shareholder meeting. no word on a stock split, new product or most of all what apple plans to do with all its cash. suzanne pratt reports. >> reporter: "a" is for apple, and it turns apple is for cash, and holding on to lots of it. despite ample pressure from investors, c.e.o. tim cook still has no concrete plans for the company's $137 billion war chest. at apple's annual shareholder meeting today, cook said the company's board remained in quote very, very active discussions about options for cash sharing. some apple experts say the tech giant is more likely to divulge those options some time in march. >> i think they can modestly raise the dividend and modestly increase the buyback without doing anything special any other sort of financing things like that. what investors are looking for is a way to use that $100 a share in cash and getting it back to the u.s. for more dividends and more buybacks. >>

$137 billion in cash that apple has on hand. the next date in this case is march 1st, the judge saying that at that point both parties should submit a joint letter outlining the next contemplated steps in the case as well as a joint management plan and

i'm willing to allocate more money into apple. >> we'll get to that discussion in a moment because apple's trading miserably compared to the overall market today. and that is a significant story in its own right. pete? >> i think joe pointed out the financials and i would specifically look not just to the xlf because all the financials, if you look at that you see it's breaking out. jp morgan still remains under book value something close to $51 a share would be boochblgt i think going through the 52-week highs today means that this stock is going to actually hit $52 a share. why do i say that? i think there are buy backs, potential for the dividend to go a little bit higher. and when i'm looking at what we've seen in the option markets they've been playing in the financials. they continue to buy the upside of the xlf. jp morgan looks like one of these names not only breaking out. i think it finally gets to book value and then is off to the races. >> dr. j.? >> trade i made right away today was carbo ceramics crr. this is a fracking play, judge. and since max meyer said i could say whateve

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einhorn and apple taking their fight to court over return of cash to apple shareholders.ck down again today and apple lost about 20% of its market value over the past three months. kate kelly is at the courthouse for us in new york city. kate. >> reporter: thanks, tyler. we're just about an hour away from what could be a contentious courtroom showdown, einhorn, founder and apple, inc. they are duking it out over a proposal in the proxy statement that would do away with charter right to issue preferred shares of stock. einhorn seeking an injunction to block the vote on that measure at apple's meeting february 27 wants apple to issue a class of shares to provide investors like him with additional value. apple is his largest holding of late and its fall in the fourth quarter accounted for damage to his portfolio in that quarter as well. apple sitting with $137 billion in cash on its balance sheet and he argues that's stockpile indicative of depression era mentality. apple is defending noting other investors calpers. blocking would eliminate other beneficial measures. would e

you do like apple. i'm curious on your take if it has whether or not put in some sort of bottom or floor. >> yeah, i mean, we haven't liked this name for a bit, because we had real issues with the form factors and the expectations. we don't -- here's the issue. on the conference call, they told you, we're not going to make cheaper phones, so, that locks out a good portion of the emerging markets. they told you, we think we have the right form factor. they don't want to make fatter phones. samsung is making a lot of money selling the galaxy s-3. those are the problems. the good news is, if you step back, apple is moving into the enterprise and they did, though, tell you on the call that they believe they can do something of substance in the tv market. so, i think you're going to see something in that coming out, brand new revenue stream for them. so, we actually, you know, just started buying it at that 450-ish level, thinking it's gotten washed out here. i still don't strategically like the fact they ar

so apple is at 449.ecause at 465 or 470, apple is a stock that can break a downtrend line. at 449, it is a stock that is still on a downtrend and why would you want to own it? >> the bottom line, tom in terms of apple, a lot of fundamental news later today. watch the technicals, don't do anything until you see it hold above that downtrend line? >> until you see it close above about 465, wherever that downtrend line is. the risk in waiting is you can get a big recognition wave of buying as everybody sees that trend line break and everybody piles in. and then the opportunity is gone. that's the risk. >> tom, before we let you run, i know you look at -- you did great work with the charts. you have an s&p chart as well you wanted to share with us in terms of the overall market as it relates to the fed. what does this chart tell us? >> well, it is all about what the fed does. when we were in the mid dle of e 3, the fed would be buying one day and selling the next and buying one day and selling the next. now a

apple ceo. let us bring in jon fortt, herb greenberg and reggie middleton, editor of the blog, should note reggie but a note out to his clients, i'm not sure the exact price point on ambassadors, dog gone near the top, saying get out of the stock. it was a great call. why did you make it and what do you see happening now? >> two reasons for making it. number one, apple is pretty much done in terms of a fat margin business model simply because the competition from google was designed -- >> you think apple's margins have peaked? they will never be as high as they have been. >> absolutely never. absolutely never. a lot of people think it's a technology race between apple and google. google used a business model to attack apple not a tech. that's a less than free model which prevents apple from charging extreme margins. apple is not done as a company. they can make better product or drop prices. make better products, r&d expenditures drop margins, drop prices drop margins. either way you look at it,

and jobs said to me, "that's the beginning of apple. started doing that blue box, i knew that with wozniak's brilliant designs and my marketing skills, we could sell anything." >> that was still a few years off. jobs enrolled at reed college in oregon at a time when timothy leary was telling students across the country to turn on, tune in, and drop out. jobs did after one semester. >> the time we grew up in was a magical time. it was also a very, you know, spiritual time in my life. definitely taking l.s.d. is one of the more important things in my life and--not the most important but right up there. >> he eventually drifted back to his parents' house and became one of the first 50 employees to work for the video game maker atari. but he was not a big hit with his coworkers. >> never wore shoes, had very long hair, never bathed. in fact, when he went to work for atari, they put him on the night shifts because people said he smelled so bad that they didn't want to work with him. >> you know, he believed that his vegan diet and the way he

you think apple is overdone to the downside and i do, i'm long apple, if you think apple will recoveruch better served in long caps rather than small. >> everybody niece this has been an overly loved large-caporaly until recently. look at the performance of large caps and small caps off the neve lows. we've seen the small caps move 20% off the lows while the large caps move 12% or 13%. so pent-up demand. >> it's because of apple. that's the singular issue there. if you're wearish apple from here, yes, stick to small caps and bullish apple and you think it's overdone then i think you want to be in the big names. >> there you go. we'll let you folks at home decide. get home safe if you've got to get through the snow tonight. see you later. >> maria? >> in the final stretch of trading. 30 minutes before the closing bell sound for the day and we've got a market that's holding up. doesn't look like it will close positive. got to be up 66 points to close positive on the week. >> the s&p and nasdaq positive for the week but the dow is the laggard. when we come back, we'll tell you which reta

pretty bullish on apple. the questions are, what are they going to do about emerging markets, how do they feel about samsung and google? tim cook said, i could push a button and churn out more devices than they are, but that wouldn't be good for apple shareholders. i'm pretty sure he was referring to margins there. people seem pretty happy with things which you might take surprising, given the stock is down from where it was a year ago when the overall markets were up, guys. >> jon, thank you. down 14% since last year's meeting. karen, do you think apple is at all responsive to share holders given they said, you know what, you may think what you want in terms of what we should do with our cash, we're very, very actively discussing it and that's it. >> maybe they don't know what the word active means. that could explain quite a bit. here is the thing about tim cook. i don't hit the he actually should -- i don't think his job is truly to worry about where the stock is trading. i'm not being sarcastic at all. i

and rotten apple? the woman who called the demise of enron explains why the tech darling has further to fall. let eelgs go straight to the traders and ask what the top trade was today. guy. >> good to be here tonight! love the rhames for a long time and if you want to go downstream in rails, we talked about this name before, had a nice day today. look at trinity industries, trn. >> karen, your top trade? >> didn't do a ton, but f and p, a name we talk about from time to time continues its upward march. >> fifth and pacific, to be exact. >> the old liz claiborne. >> steve grasso? >> goldman sachs. poised to make a move to $173. tim? >> we continue to think the world markets are stretched. in that way, we think emerging markets have underperformed. we are long eem. we got short some mxwo, which is the msci world which is stretched and i think it is a sell here. >> let's get to a trade we are all watching today. shares of apple climbing mid-session and then to close the session lower. the question we ask

they really outlined what apple needs to do with its cash balance, and he said apple is very innovative in a lot of different areas. one area they're not innovating is with their balance sheet, and with their cash balance. he came up with a new instrument, a new idea called perpetual preferred stock, which he called i-pref. that would be about a $50 billion issuance of preferred stock to existing shareholders and yield 4%. apple wouldn't have to dish out any cash, other than the $2 billion in dividends a year, and shareholders would get a nice-year-old. >> tom: so what was the response or what do you anticipate the response to come from apple? >> they're going to have their shareholder meeting next week. last year, they initiated their first dividend and stock buyback in march. and i would expect something to come out relatively soon, probably in the march time frame regarding an increased dividend and a bigger buy-back. i think investors agree with what david is proposing. again, it doesn't have to be his exact idea of the i-pref or perpetual preferred stock but i think giving more cas

-- >> before it was apple.y company i know, news corp, rupp. murdoch runs a private company public spends a huge amount of time talking about capital allocation, get stock moving. apple stock would be much high fer they addressed this problem in a way einhorn, a very smart guy, not necessarily perpetual preferred but i think the stocks are under pressure, they have offer nod clarity for the cash, a negative some. how. >> it is. it is a negative. >> more of it. if you had in your portfolio this percentage of cash in your net wealth it would be irresponsible, you would be losing money, in effect. >> makes no sense. doesn't make any sense. >> my travel trust agree. >> a number of year ago -- >> who? >> microsoft was and the stock reacted positively for a while and then it returned to where it had come from because, of course, the growth prospects for the company were still insignificant question. your point, growth is the key -- >> do this in the meantime to get a leg higher until they announce their five-inch pho

>> takeaway apple has been clearly deficient and somewhat arrogant in regards to what the apple allocation strategy is. goldman sachs put out a report saying their take january way was that apple is the conviction buy for them, they firmly believe the capital allocation story will intensify and that the product cycles which is important for them are going to shorten. i don't know necessarily if i believe that, and i think what really has happened here is the growth investor has left the apple story, the value investor is really not satisfied what they're hearing from apple and i think it's really becoming as pete najarian correctly identified a late second half story. >> slim shady? >> what's interesting with apple and a lot of the big techs holding on to so much cash oversea, one thing that could boost this market is president obama came out and gave them some sort of break to bring that cash back into the u.s. that would get a company like apple surging and get a company like google, cisco even would start to move on that. i think that's something to watch for but apple will do something

couldn't afford to buy apple.avid: a how do you, what is your relationship with apple? we understand that you could be increasing their market share and the enthusiasm for iphones by what you do but do they tell you that directly? do you work with them directly any way or what? >> so there are two sides to our business. in the u.s. where we collect the device tros consumers and pay consumers for the devices the role that we play in the apple ecosystem is enabling the apple enthusiast to upgrade more frequently. when the iphone 5 came out in october, about a third of the product that we bought directly back from consumer were apple iphone 4ss. it is an incredible amount of upgrades that are happening a year after the 4s was introduced. we're seeing a lot of upgrades that the trade-ins are driving, i'm sure apple loves that. as far as the emerging markets, again we provide access to apple products in those markets to an audience that other wise would not have apple products in their hopes. david: net-net, this is go

big question, how does apple turn a small screen into important connective real estate and how can appleonnect us with a screen pretty much too small for navigation. >> let's talk more about what this watch means for apple and what indeed the company can do with all that cash. let's talk about the cash pile, and john, the expectation there in advance of this, these conference or analyst conference tomorrow with tim cook, exactly what he could say, john, that could move the stock. >> i think the place to start, a lot of people are forgetting, they have around $137 in cash and equivalents. the stuff not in the u.s. is really difficult for apple to repay tree ought without a big penalty. we are talking in the neighborhood of $40 billion. it seems like from what apple put out in the statement last week, they are planning to do some sort of extra thing beyond their announced dividend. but it is a smaller pile of cash than people talk about. >> let me bring in molly woo had from c-net. do you they they get in terms of how shareholders are feeling a the moment and how do you think he will respo

did apple win?ple won. >> i don't know what will happen on appeal. >> they lost. >> i don't know if that will happen on appeal. >> this is in the scheme of things, not that important of a company but it's been a heck of a -- >> mad money recommended this is great call option play and i'm standing by that. >> good. >> okay. >> standing by that. >> brian, did you want to come in as well. >> yeah, i got a couple comment watching that. it's been a long time since herb's mic has been yanked like that and we have to have a new name for josh lipton. you called him j man. i called him iced tea. >> that is taken. he can't be iced tea two. >> no, that's ice tea. this is iced tea. a play -- because he is -- >> oh, not a nickname. i'm sticking with the j man. sorry. >> it is definitely iced tea. i will call him iced tea and you can call him the j man and we will fight for eternity. >> very quickly, cramer, anything else you are watching we need to watch out for. >> a week ago people were telling you to get out

down 20%, apple up 20%.le been the atm for google? >> absolutely. if you want to know where all that apple money went -- >> it could be netflix, as well, a lot of the other names -- >> of course. in terms of the market cap, if you think about google being 260 billion, apple that 450 billion, you need a big cap name to put those dollars into. and google's been the beneficiary. the thing i would point out on google, you look at the last three years, we've had six selloffs north of 10% and three of those have happened on the march quarter. the last three years, march quarter have started a downward decline of 10%. we heard about the pain at the pump, the payroll taxes, march quarter for consumer activity may be less than stellar. >> so, for seasonal reasons, stay away from the google trade? >> it will be below 800 this spring. >> so, what is your top trade in tech? >> listen, you want exposure to mobile, e-commerce, the nice tail winds, let's buy ebay. >> the consumer being weak doesn't freak you out when it co

investor not playing in apple. the growth investor went away, but if they do that, that's a big risk to howard because there could be inflows coming in from value investors to get the stock price up. that would hurt. >> there's 55 analysts to cover the stock, 40-something bullish. i don't believe the growth guys are out. dennis: rob, your tech angle, what can apple do to prove, make howard lose money here? >> well, i mean, we have the iwatch coming. we have, supposedly, an itv thing coming. if they execute with a set top box strategy and not a tv, the watch is compelling, but overshadowed by google glass. address the head mount display moving forward. showcase they can invo vat, lead the markets, and get samsung chasest chasing them. that's the only thing that brings them back. they are a premium class vendor in a mainstream market. they are trending to be a chevy. need the market chases them. until it's happening, they are not moving. dennis: google glass-like products and apple wristwatch, they are in trouble. th

>> sony could have been apple. >> sony could have been apple, and it wasn't. they are trailing.erformance is disappointing. tv division has been in the red. they are trying to invest and innovate, but it is not happening fast enough. handheld devices and televisions have been lagging. what is interesting is they have a big announcement coming up on february 20th opinion we expect that to be about a new play station, that would be great. in the meanwhile, they are warning their handheld gaming devices are not moving fast enough. because if you can play games on your ipad, your iphone, you don't need a separate gaming device. >> my 7-year-old son would not agree with that. he loves his ps -- he would not agree with that. >> neither would my son. thanks, ty. >>> we go cross country with the powerhouse taking a look at one of the top 20 housing markets. and we will show you where the wall streeters these days are looking to relocate. you will not believe the price tag on some of these homes. then, it's do or die time for logitech ceo. he will talk about how he plans to save his comp

i just think that apple is fantastic.m wondering about this because what is going on in china is these guys out there in china are saying the men in china are saying that we won't mourn apple products. we want cheaper apple iphone's. dc is going for $99? what does that mean for apple in a. >> in the united states you can get an iphone for free with the contract. so i do believe that apple is way more interested in lower price points than it ever was before. it hurts profit margins. but it's really good for growth. it really shows that they want market share and customers and they are getting them. the company is evolving. liz: to adams point, adam has been working very hard to get a hookup in china mobile. that means way more people buying apple products. you know, when you think it through, the market share they could get is astonishing around the world. >> exactly. you have to remember apple es the little things very well. when you walk through virtually any mall, the apple store is always crowded. sometimes there is mo

michael pento of portfolio strategies says it's the negative sentiment driven by apple, apple and itsharp fall has been casting a dark shadow over tech making investors more hesitant to invest in this shape. seeing shares slightly higher, that's apple but keep in mind shares of apple roughly down still 14% this year. maria. >> thanks so much, seema. we're sitting right at 14,000, threatening to go up below it. we're at 14,001 so it can go any way here. >> sweaty palms. >> sweaty palms. >> it's what i hear on friday. right down to the wire on friday. >> even at 4:00, it just was settling out. >> yeah. meanwhile, apple out with the latest version of the ipad today with all the same features as the last version, except at 128 gigabytes this one has double the storage capacity. >> however, unlike other ipads this, fourth generation is not getting much buzz. on the left side of the screen there, this is what the lines looks like in 2010 when the first ipad came out and on the right side, same apple store today. so is this a sign that the stock won't be coming back any time soon. the lines

here it's all on the down side for apple. apple has a stench about it.say what or why, but there's a feeling that there's something nasty at the back of the fridge. that needs to be rooted out. google, back of the fridge that needs to be rooted out. google, on the other hand, which doesn't have that same fierce competition that apple has from android. google has competitors of its own but it still remains the industry standard on surge. it still has many core markets that it's holding on to, much tighter than apple in its own domain. the share price, i repeat, ali, is a reflection of earnings and investor sentiment. and if you look at that share price now, it's not surprising they're going, whoop, in opposite directions. >> topping $800 a share for the first time this past week. >> and, and, and, and, and brokerage analysts suggesting it could hit 1,000. but remember, markets are not like a swiss clock. they overshoot one way, and then the other. so, look for speculation and bubbles. >> we should look -- that advice spreads to the broader market, as well

apple is also down, apple stock falling again well over 2%, while some say dump it, apple's the number one holding in the william blair growth fund and the fund manager of the fund says he's sticking with apple stock. he'll be here to tell us why apple is coming back. liz: our own charlie has been reporting a deal for a leveraged buy out of dell could be announce the as early as this week. guess who could be in on it? microsoft could pay a few billion for a piece of this action. we have an analyst saying this is actually good for microsoft, and you, the shareholder, he'll be here to tell us why. daiched daifd before -- david: before that, what drove the market? dow and s&p posting the biggest declines on the year on concern about europe's debt crisis. all three ending the trading day lower. nasdaq with the biggest loss of a 1.5% loss. technology and financials were today's worst performing sectors. platinum rallying to a four month high as output at the world's largest producer fell amid rising demand. platinum up 10% this year, closing the trading day below $1700 an ounce. factory ord

which apple wanted.re was a proposal that executives be rider to hold a third of their stock until retirement age. that was also voted down. shareholders questions ran the range. some even asked why there are no bathrooms on the third street store in southern california. an lot of pressure on them today. >> thank you very much, j jon fortt. hi, seema. >> hi, sue. we are up on the day following through bear nanky's comments on the fed monetary policy. in response traders seem to use the risk on approach to trading. a lot of volatility in shares of apple as jonfortt was just mentioning. we are seeing shares of apple done on the day. also take a look at one sector on a tear, on-line travel players. priceline reporting better than expected earnings. ceo jeffrey boyd speaking here on "power lunch" about the firm's strong domestic and international presence. its peers also getting a bit in today's trade within biotech, take a look at vertex pharmaceuticals. a cystic fibrosis fatal drug, projecting cystic fibro