Apple Share Price Hits $600, Just One Month After Hitting $500

Apple's share price touched the $600 mark as trading opened this morning, just a month after reaching $500/share for the first time. The stock has, however, pulled back slightly since the open and now sits at $594.

The stock price has been on a tear ever since Apple reported blowout earnings for the first fiscal quarter of 2012, rising nearly $180/share, or close to 40%, in under two months.

aapl 600
At the end of February, Apple broke through the important psychological barrier of $500 billion in market capitalization. Apple is the most valuable publicly traded company in the world, worth nearly $560 billion, more than $150 billion higher than second-place ExxonMobil.

Apple is now within $50 billion of claiming the "most valuable publicly traded company ever" title. According to the S&P, Microsoft had a peak market cap of $604 billion during the dot-com boom in December 1999. Adjusted for inflation, Microsoft was worth $813.42 billion in January 2012 dollars at its peak, and Apple would have to reach $873/share to surpass that total.

Top Rated Comments

bbeagle Avatar
157 months ago
What goes up must come down.

A company's value has nothing to do with gravity.
Score: 49 Votes (Like | Disagree)
AJayAgliolio Avatar
157 months ago
Wow, imagine how rich Forrest Gump would be today with all his Apple stock... :P
Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Avatar74 Avatar
157 months ago
I'm still kicking myself for not buying stock when it was less than $200 ... :mad:
It's as I told a close friend yesterday, buying AAPL is not an investment strategy. There are two important words there: "investment" and "strategy".

Investment requires active research, and making decisions not based on speculative plays but a sound analysis of the value of the asset being acquired. Hearing about a company as ubiquitous as Apple and then jumping on board on the assumption that it'll keep going up (remember the housing market?) is not investing.

If all of Apple's enterprise were struck by a meteor tomorrow and wiped off the face of the planet, would the average Apple speculator be well insulated from that catastrophe in the rest of their portfolio. Would their "sit and presume infinite growth" tack work with the broader market?

If the answer to questions like these is "no" then whatever else you want to call it, it's not investing, and it's not a strategy.

Spend less time beating yourself up for "shoulda, woulda, coulda" on a company that could have just as easily gone the other way... and start beefing up your knowledge of investing, and insulate yourself against potential catastrophic loss. THAT, and not consistent huge wins, is what will growth your wealth tremendously in the long term.

Chasing unsustainable returns is a sure fire way to expose your principal to risk of loss... and that kind of loss compounds over time. I don't miss the AAPL boat because I have much more stable long term investments that are actually providing pretty stellar returns, very close to Apple's.... but without the volatility of the umpteen zillion speculators who are all sitting and hoping with their eyes closed and ears shut.

I'm not saying that Apple will do terribly, but Apple's book value is well below 600 dollars per share. So the difference is owing entirely to speculation on where they will go in the future. That works perfectly as long as Apple keeps producing double digit growth infinitely... but its the "infinitely" part that is a statistical impossibility. Growth rates have to shrink at that scale because a) Apple is gaining share of wallet much faster than the number of wallets or size of wallets is increasing, and b) Apple has to produce exponentially more marginal revenue each quarter just to maintain the same growth rate mathematically.

And then there's the Steve factor... any time a business's image and success are so inextricably tied to an iconic figure you cannot top that. No one will ever take the reins of Apple with a greater vested interest than Steve had. No visionary of Steve's caliber will prefer to work for Apple over starting his own company.

A shrewd investor is like a good hockey player... skate to where the puck is going next, not to where it is now.
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
r.j.s Avatar
157 months ago
I'm still kicking myself for not buying stock when it was less than $200 ... :mad:
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
basesloaded190 Avatar
157 months ago
Anyone got a time machine? Would love to go back a few years...

Yeah to 1975 to meet Steve and become an original investor in the company.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Stetrain Avatar
157 months ago
Imagine how high it would be if the iPad 3 hadn't been so disappointing :rolleyes:
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

iPhone 16 Camera Lozenge 2 Perspective Gray

Five Key Upgrades Coming to iPhone 16

Friday March 15, 2024 1:45 pm PDT by
The iPhone is Apple's top-selling product, and it gets an update every year. In 2024, we're expecting the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro lineup, with an arguably more interesting feature set than we got with the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Capture Button All four iPhone 16 models are set to get a whole new button, which will be...
When To Expect New iPads Feature 1

Apple to Announce New iPads on March 26, Rumors Claim

Monday March 18, 2024 4:02 am PDT by
Apple is widely expected to release new iPad Air and OLED iPad Pro models in the next few weeks. According to new rumors coming out of Asia, the company will announce its new iPads on Tuesday, March 26. Chinese leaker Instant Digital on Weibo this morning 日发布%23">claimed that the date will see some sort of announcement from Apple related to new iPads, but stopped short of calling it an...
airpods 3 orange

Two New AirPods 4 Models Expected to Launch in September or October

Sunday March 17, 2024 7:56 am PDT by
Apple suppliers will begin production of two new fourth-generation AirPods models in May, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Based on this production timeframe, he expects the headphones to be released in September or October. Gurman expects both fourth-generation AirPods models to feature a new design with better fit, improved sound quality, and an updated charging case with a USB-C...
iphone se 4 modified flag edges

iPhone SE 4 Expected to Depreciate Heavily

Tuesday March 12, 2024 9:04 am PDT by
Resale value trends suggest the iPhone SE 4 may not hold its value as well as Apple's flagship models, according to SellCell. According to the report, Apple's iPhone SE models have historically depreciated much more rapidly than the company's more premium offerings. The third-generation iPhone SE, which launched in March 2022, experienced a significant drop in resale value, losing 42.6%...
General iOS 17 Feature Orange Purple

iOS 17.4.1 Update for iPhone is Imminent

Monday March 18, 2024 5:27 am PDT by
iOS 17.4.1 and iPadOS 17.4.1 should be released within the next few days, with a build number of 21E235, according to a source with a proven track record. MacRumors previously reported that Apple was internally testing iOS 17.4.1. As a minor update for the iPhone, it will likely address software bugs and/or security vulnerabilities. It is unclear if the update will include any other changes. ...
iOS 17 Passkey With Apple ACCOUNT Feature

'Apple ID' Expected to Change to 'Apple Account' Starting With iOS 18

Sunday March 17, 2024 7:13 am PDT by
MacRumors was first to report that Apple was planning to rebrand "Apple ID" to "Apple Account" across its software platforms and websites like iCloud.com as early as this year, and now Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has corroborated this change. A mockup of the new Apple Account branding In his Power On newsletter today, Gurman said the new "Apple Account" branding will start to be used later this...
M3 iPad Feature 3

New iPads Likely to Begin Shipping in April

Monday March 18, 2024 9:52 am PDT by
Apple's new iPad Pro models with OLED displays will likely begin shipping to customers in April, according to information shared today by Ross Young, CEO of display industry research firm Display Supply Chain Consultants. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman also said the new iPad Pro models might not ship until "deeper" into April in his Power On newsletter on Sunday:I've repeatedly said that new...