After being sued by one of its investors over demands that it should share more of its $137 billion cash pile to its shareholders, Apple has said it is "evaluating" the possibilities of doing so.
Manager David Einhorn of hedge fund Greenlight Capital, recently stressed that Apple had a "Depression-era" mentality, which made it hesitant to share its cash and generally play it safe. Einhorn stressed that the firm should distribute preferred stock to current shareholders, but Apple dismissed the idea when it was first discussed.
Einhorn added that while he understands why Apple maintains its large cash pile to be strategic, carry out acquisitions and be secure, he believes offering preferred shares to existing shareholders would allow Apple to share its cash while still boasting a substantial amount of its own.
In a statement, Apple stressed that it's aware that its cash has grown beyond what's required to run daily operations, but it's considering several possibilities in regards to sharing its $137 billion cash pile. Either way, even though it's no longer the world's most valuable firm, that amount has continued Apple's position as the world's richest company.
By early last year, Apple's cash balance had built to a point beyond what we needed to run our business and maintain flexibility to take advantage of strategic opportunities, so we announced a plan to return $45 billion to shareholders over three years. As of next week we will have executed $10 billion of that plan.We find ourselves in the fortunate position of continuing to generate large amounts of cash, including $23 billion in cash flow from operations in the last quarter alone.Apple's management team and Board of Directors have been in active discussions about returning additional cash to shareholders. As part of our review, we will thoroughly evaluate Greenlight Capital's current proposal to issue some form of preferred stock. We welcome Greenlight's views and the views of all of our shareholders.As a part of our efforts to further enhance corporate governance and serve our shareholders' best interests, Proposal #2 in our proxy includes some recommended changes to our articles of incorporation. These changes were recommended independently of Greenlight's proposal and would not preclude Apple from adopting their concept. Contrary to Greenlight's statements, adoption of Proposal #2 would not prevent the issuance of preferred stock. Currently, Apple's articles of incorporation provide for the issuance of "blank check" preferred stock by the Board of Directors without shareholder approval. If Proposal #2 is adopted, our shareholders would have the right to approve the issuance of preferred stock. As such, Proposal #2 has the support of many of our shareholders.We remain committed to having an ongoing dialogue with our shareholders to get perspectives around return of capital and driving shareholder value.
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Zak Islam is a freelance writer focusing on security, networking, and general computing. His work also appears at Digital Trends and Tom's Guide.
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A Bad Day If you got so much problem with a company stiffing you on stock dividends, then you can always get a different stock...Reply -
ELMO_2006 Once again the shareholders thinking with their pockets!!! Good on Apple to snub their noses at these requests. Shareholders have no idea how the day to day operations of a company run, they are more concerned about large margins than the health of a company. Make their 500% return and then on to the next company as they try to suck the other company dry! I see it happen all the time at the company I work at. Making billions hands over fists and at the same time complaining how the margins are thin and they need to answer to the shareholders thus cut, cut , CUT!Reply
Kudos to Apple on this front. -
m32 Mr. Stockholder, I don't like Apple's business practices but they know how to do this and do it very well... MAKE MONEY! Y u complain?Reply -
emperor piehead You know apple you should give that money to Google that is enough to cover all of the US in Google fiber. Too bad that would never happenReply -
Why do they need investors when they have $137 billion in cash, buy them out and go private? im not into finance so i could be missing something but...Reply
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Abion47 Meanwhile, Bill Gates is giving billions of dollars of money to charity, much of which is out of his own pocket...Reply -
SneakySnake Abion47Meanwhile, Bill Gates is giving billions of dollars of money to charity, much of which is out of his own pocket...Reply
well I would certainly hope he's not giving other people's money away. That kinda defeats the point of charity ;) -
madjimms Abion47Meanwhile, Bill Gates is giving billions of dollars of money to charity, much of which is out of his own pocket...I'm no Microsoft ass-kisser, but Between it & Bill/Malinda it has done more things in a decade than Apple has done for the past 30 years.Reply -
SneakySnake MadjimmsI'm no Microsoft ass-kisser, but Between it & Bill/Malinda it has done more things in a decade than Apple has done for the past 30 years.Reply
Apple's given you the modern version of the smartphone and tablet (yes, they didn't invent them, but without the iPhone/Pad the smartphone market would likely still be full keyboards, and their would be no tablet market).
Apple contributes to society by pushing the tech industry forward, most recent example being retina displays in laptops.
Now, obviously they could afford to donate billions and do not, but they're a business, I do not expect them to donate. I expect individuals to donate (apple execs), which they haven't done nearly enough of.