Apple PR linky...

The numbers are huge and represent historic highs (except the iPod #'s).

37 million iPhones, 15.4 million iPads, 15.3 million iPods, 5.19 million Macs.... $46 billion in revenue, $13 billion in profit, $13.87 diluted earnings per share, $97.6 billion in cash (this balance grew $16 billion over the quarter). Gross margins were at 44%.

Execs continue to discuss the cash balance hoard, but have nothing to announce. $64 billion of it is held outside the U.S. (which is why Apple was one of the many companies lobbying for a tax holiday to repatriate that money back into the U.S.) Opinion: the current cash balance exceeds the market capitalization of many other firms in the S&P 500. Apple says their acquisition strategy is primarily smaller companies. I'm all for their approach of keeping dry powder available for deals and acquisitions (including the possibility of larger ones) but this number is now reaching ludicrous levels where I believe they should do two things.

1) Announce a share repurchase program (meant to offset the HFT algorithms which have kept the stock from performing much more aligned to its actual earnings performance). Announcing and executing are two separate things. This will offset the continued pinning of the stock from options as well as technical trading while slowly increasing earnings per share as the outstanding float is reduced during those periods. 2) Re-institution of a dividend which will make it more attractive to both institutional and retail investors to hold the stock. Some mutual funds are unable to hold non-dividend paying stocks while those that do cannot add any more since they are maxed out based on fund diversification rules. Neither of these initiatives will burn any sizable hole in their pocket.

The stock did pop in after hours trading but I tend to not pay attention to that since AAPL has rarely made big percentage moves to the upside without giving up a good portion of that by the closing bell during regular trading. Whatever gap that exists will also need to be filled so seasoned traders already know this and will be selling into the strength and then re-entering somewhere between $420-$430 once the dust settles.

The road to $550 and higher isn't going to be a quick one but considering the #'s, it doesn't take a genius to figure out what the iPad 3 and iPhone 5 will do when they are each released. AAPL at anything below $450 is a screaming buy because there is still upside to ROI on a percentage basis.

Usual disclosure: long AAPL

iPhone #'s will probably be through the roof. Question are the iPad and Mac numbers as well as margins. Guidance for the next quarter as usual will be key to how the stock reacts (in terms of the HFT algorithms that now drive this game).

Wording of product transitions during the conference call should tell us when the iPad 3 is due.

Personally, I expect the usual... for the stock to sell off (i.e. the P/E compression will continue and the coiled spring will go grow tighter -- something is going to have to give pretty soon if this trend continues).

Linky...

Unsurprising. And likewise unsurprising was how the stock crept up to all time highs over the course of this past quarter leading up to this earnings report where just a few weeks ago, I dumped the remainder of my shares near those highs. Then earlier in the week, an analyst downgrades the stock (when it is too late when most of the smart money has gotten out). And as mentioned before, the ugliness hasn't even reared its head yet with the dead weight (MMI) that will drag on GOOG. In the meantime. GOOG will end up as a trading plaything to create more money out of thin air while also destroying wealth by those naive to this game that happens like clockwork on Wall Street.

This other article is unflattering regarding Google's history of systemic theft which they use to their advantage when it comes to online advertisement. What I'm wondering is when the whole online advertising deck of cards will fall? (I've seen evidence of some sites which provide no particular value and do nothing but link baiting utilizing search engine optimization techniques, all for the purpose of garnering prime placement in Google's search index; some of those sites pull in 5 figure checks from Google per month based on ad impressions and/or click thru).

Linky....

MMI now expects sales of around $3.4 billion (expectations were around $3.9 billion) which is no different from the previous year (flat growth). Units sold during the quarter were 10.5 million which is down from Q3 sales of 11.6 million. That of course is coming on the heels of this holiday season. And Google is buying this turd on a stick for $12+ billion (the deal is subject to approval by regulators). Apple is of course partially responsible for this with the release of the iPhone 4S during MMI's 4th quarter/

This is also why I previously had mentioned wanting to divest the remaining shares of GOOG I owned before this dead weight is merged into Google which will have a negative effect in the future. I had been waiting patiently for the smart money to drive GOOG back up to its previous highs before dumping those shares. Back on January 3rd, I exited the remainder of my position at $665 per share.