Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) Receives Consensus Rating of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has been given a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by the thirty-five ratings firms that are presently covering the company, MarketBeat reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, eleven have issued a hold recommendation, twenty-two have given a buy recommendation and one has issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year price objective among analysts that have covered the stock in the last year is $208.06.

A number of brokerages have issued reports on AAPL. Tigress Financial upped their target price on Apple from $240.00 to $245.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, May 30th. UBS Group restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $190.00 target price on shares of Apple in a research note on Tuesday, June 11th. Morgan Stanley reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $216.00 price target on shares of Apple in a research report on Tuesday, June 11th. Sanford C. Bernstein raised Apple from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $195.00 price target for the company in a research note on Monday, April 29th. Finally, DA Davidson raised Apple from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $200.00 to $230.00 in a research note on Tuesday, June 11th.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, SVP Deirdre O’brien sold 54,732 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $168.91, for a total transaction of $9,244,782.12. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 136,572 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $23,068,376.52. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, SVP Deirdre O’brien sold 54,732 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $168.91, for a total transaction of $9,244,782.12. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 136,572 shares in the company, valued at approximately $23,068,376.52. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Timothy D. Cook sold 99,183 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $170.03, for a total value of $16,864,085.49. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 3,377,407 shares in the company, valued at $574,260,512.21. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 346,270 shares of company stock valued at $60,880,196. Insiders own 0.06% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Apple

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Yeomans Consulting Group Inc. bought a new position in shares of Apple in the 4th quarter worth approximately $1,713,000. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Apple by 11.8% in the fourth quarter. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. now owns 15,511 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $2,986,000 after buying an additional 1,643 shares in the last quarter. Headinvest LLC lifted its position in shares of Apple by 1.7% in the third quarter. Headinvest LLC now owns 53,155 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $9,236,000 after buying an additional 872 shares in the last quarter. GLOBALT Investments LLC GA purchased a new stake in Apple during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $38,406,000. Finally, Barden Capital Management Inc. raised its position in Apple by 132.8% during the fourth quarter. Barden Capital Management Inc. now owns 32,636 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $6,283,000 after purchasing an additional 18,615 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 60.41% of the company’s stock.

Apple Price Performance

Shares of AAPL opened at $214.29 on Wednesday. Apple has a 12 month low of $164.07 and a 12 month high of $220.20. The company has a market cap of $3.29 trillion, a P/E ratio of 33.33, a PEG ratio of 2.59 and a beta of 1.25. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $185.62 and a 200 day moving average price of $184.36. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.24, a current ratio of 1.04 and a quick ratio of 0.99.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The iPhone maker reported $1.53 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.51 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $90.75 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $90.37 billion. Apple had a return on equity of 148.33% and a net margin of 26.31%. Apple’s revenue was down 4.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $1.52 earnings per share. On average, research analysts forecast that Apple will post 6.58 earnings per share for the current year.

Apple declared that its board has authorized a stock buyback program on Thursday, May 2nd that allows the company to repurchase $110.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization allows the iPhone maker to buy up to 3.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Apple Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 16th. Stockholders of record on Monday, May 13th were issued a dividend of $0.25 per share. This is an increase from Apple’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.24. The ex-dividend date was Friday, May 10th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.47%. Apple’s payout ratio is currently 15.55%.

About Apple

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.