Comments

Recently Apple saw it's market cap fall by a massive $70bn. What was the cause of this? The company is remarkably profitable in a notoriously low profit market. They been capturing market share from the other main players in the market and they remain dominant in the personal media player space. They were not forecasting the end of the world. They lost market value because they forecast a softer Q1, in line with many economists' own concerns about a possible recession. This is a responsible thing for Apple to have done. So did it deserve such a pounding on Wall Street? The short answer is NO. Was Apple stock over-valued? At a P/E of 50 at the peak I would say NO. This is a professionally managed and highly respectable company deserving a P/E of 50 (remember folks that there were P/Es of 1000+ just before the crash in '01!).. So what we are seeing is typical of a bear market. Analysts are trying to slay Goliath and talk down the stocks on the basis that they will make a whole load more money when the market bounces back. Apple is forecast to rise back to $200 per share within 1 year. So this little story about a paltry 1m iPhones which 'might' be unlocked out there somewhere is so insignificant to Apple's overall performance that it should be ignored. It is just one of those useless bits of analyst rumor and innuendo which is used to assure that pension funds get smaller so that fat cats in the city can buy that new Ferarri....

Oh Dear, Coming from Europe, I have the unfortunate perspective in seeing just how 'in the dark' US citizens are about global warming (and indeed on many other global issues which are covered by the media outside of the US). It is sad to see also how this is precipitated by a President that cares only about the oil industry and who personally led the initiative to pull out of the Kyoto agreement days after he took office. When your readers make false statements about how much science proves that global warming is not really happening it is worrying but inevitable in an ill-informed society where balanced and impartial news rarely makes it into the living room. When suposedly well educated and responsible managers of major coprorations such as GM make such ridiculous claims then it is truly alarming. The scientific community is OVERWHELMINGLY agreed that global warming is happening and the sooner we get the likes of Mr Lutz to accept the facts, the sooner we can bring the great citizens of the USA on board and take steps to try and help reduce global warming. Until that time, I really fear for the future, and especially for our children. If you think some parts of Africa are bad today where water and electricity is scarce, just wait until the USA starts to run out of oil and sees the full ravages of global warming 20-30 years from now.