An analyst with a $270 target and "sell short" rating may have a credibility problem
Zabitsky on CNBC
I applaud my CNNMoney colleague Hibah Yousuf for trying to pin down which hedge funds have been dumping their Apple (AAPL) shares lately, but I'm not sure I would have used ACI Research's Edward Zabitsky as a source for a piece entitled Not everyone loves Apple's stock.
To call Zabitsky's most recent note -- published Jan. 25 -- an outlier is an understatement. He set a $270 price target on a day when the stock was trading over $450 and advised investors to "sell short" just before a run that would take Apple to over $526.
The following Monday CNBC did something it rarely does. It invited Zabitsky to appear on its Halftime Report and grilled him mercilessly -- and quite skeptically -- for six long minutes. See here.
Long before then, however, Zabitsky was famous among Apple investors for his "sky is falling" Apple soundbites. AAPLInvestors Terry Gregory has been collecting them on his iPhone Death Watch for years:
To which we can add, from Zabitsky's Jan. 25 note:
We asked Zabitsky if he was serious about his $270 price target and his "sell short" rating, and he was kind enough to reply:
"To be clear," he wrote, "shorting is for professionals. Individuals should just be asking themselves if Apple is as invincible as they think.
"My targets are based upon my expectations for the business over a two year time frame. They are not based upon the current share price. In 2007, my targets were all well below the share prices, in late February 2009, my targets were all far above the share prices.
"The difference between me and my competitors is that I had a successful buy-side career. I have also had 20 years of experience talking to high tech people who are far smarter than I am. Futhermore, I do not have a trading desk breathing down my neck."
A blogger-analyst highlights the growing gap between its earnings and its stock price
Click to enlarge. Source: Bullish Cross.
"In just four-years," writes Andy Zaky in a passionately worded post published Sunday on his Bullish Cross blog, "Apple's earnings have grown 600% to $27.68, and its revenue skyrocketed 341% to $108.2 billion. That's the most explosive 4-year growth rate of any large-cap company on the entire S&P 500."
Yet Apple's (AAPL) shares closed MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Nov 28, 2011 7:15 AM ET
CNBC's favorite Apple basher, now at CNN, hasn't changed her snarky tone
Burnett on Oct. 4. Source: CNN
On Oct. 4, the day Apple (AAPL) unveiled the iPhone 4S, CNN's Erin Burnett aired one of her "Seriously?!" pieces, a format in which the straight-talking anchor uses a mocking tone to puncture what- or whomever her target happens to be that day.
On Tuesday, it was the pre-announcement buzz surrounding the new iPhone.
"We MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 8, 2011 7:00 AM ET
When the rest of the market is tanking, the company's shares offer a relatively safe haven
On Monday, when the Dow opened down $250, Apple (AAPL) rose $11.13 (2.78%) to close at a new record $411.63. On Tuesday, Apple opened at $415.35 and hit $422.86 shortly after noon.
UPDATE: Apple closed Tuesday nearly where it started, at $413.45, up $1.82 (.44%) for the day.
To put Monday's close in perspective:
Apple shares were up MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Sep 20, 2011 7:33 AM ET
How the world's richest nation and the most valuable tech company stack up
Souces: Apple Inc., U.S. Treasury Daily Report
Unless the debt ceiling is raised by Tuesday Aug. 2, the White House keeps reminding us, the U.S. government will no longer be able to pay its bills.
But the U.S. Treasury is already running low. Its closing balance as of Wednesday, July 27, was $73.768 billion.
To put that in perspective, Apple (AAPL) MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jul 29, 2011 6:38 AM ET
The documentary that premiers Thursday night covers some well-plowed ground
Source: CNBC
There could be a few surprises in the hour-long biography of Steve Jobs that will kick off this year's "CNBC Titans" series. But judging from the previews and Web-extra videos posted on the show's site, it's a long shot.
For people who have followed the career of Apple's (AAPL) co-founder and CEO, the photography and film clips will have a MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jun 23, 2011 7:11 AM ET
Bloomberg Television is still stuck in Siberia in the Comcast channel lineup, and it's right to ask the FCC to step in.
Bloomberg TV
FORTUNE -- One of the main worries surrounding Comcast's (CMCSA) merger with NBC Universal was that Comcast would use its cable platform to favor its own programming at the expense of competitors. From the beginning, the financial news organization Bloomberg has issued perhaps the loudest complaints about MORE
Dan Mitchell, contributor - Jun 15, 2011 11:11 AM ET
The founding partner of Elevation Partners has changed his tune about Apple
Source: CNBC
Remember Roger McNamee? He's the founding partner of the venture capital firm Elevation Partners -- a major investor in the Palm Pre -- who predicted on the two-year anniversary of the original iPhone that nobody who bought it would be using an iPhone a month later.
"Think about it," he said, in a remark I suspect he immediately MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 14, 2011 6:08 PM ET
Erin Burnett has hit on what she must think is a winning formula
Source: CNBC
I don't spend a lot of time watching CNBC, but I've seen enough of Erin Burnett's coverage of Apple (AAPL) to see the pattern.
Last fall, it was an interview with Tiger Management's Julian Robertson in which she tried -- and failed -- to get him to call Apple's rising stock price a "bubble." (See How not MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 20, 2011 8:05 AM ET
Erin Burnett. Image: CNBC
If CNBC's Erin Burnett weren't born yesterday, she would know that when Julian Robertson likes a stock, he really likes it. When he ran Tiger Management, one of the early hedge funds, his motto was "find the 200 best companies in the world and invest in them, and find the 200 worst companies in the world and go short on them."
But she was born yesterday. So MORE
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| Company | Price | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bank of America Corp... | 7.95 | -0.16 | -1.97% |
| Microsoft Corp | 31.27 | -0.17 | -0.54% |
| Ford Motor Co | 12.28 | -0.25 | -2.00% |
| General Electric Co | 19.39 | 0.17 | 0.88% |
| Citigroup Inc | 32.36 | -1.00 | -3.00% |
| Index | Last | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dow | 12,938.67 | -27.02 | -0.21% |
| Nasdaq | 2,933.17 | -15.40 | -0.52% |
| S&P 500 | 1,357.66 | -4.55 | -0.33% |
| Treasuries | 2.00 | -0.04 | -1.96% |
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