Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC Reduces Position in Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC cut its stake in shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) by 33.4% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 39,852 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock after selling 19,958 shares during the period. Apple comprises about 1.8% of Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 6th largest position. Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Apple were worth $9,980,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. EdgeRock Capital LLC raised its holdings in Apple by 2.6% in the 4th quarter. EdgeRock Capital LLC now owns 27,717 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $6,941,000 after acquiring an additional 692 shares during the last quarter. Fairhaven Wealth Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Apple by 0.3% in the 4th quarter. Fairhaven Wealth Management LLC now owns 79,165 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $19,825,000 after purchasing an additional 244 shares in the last quarter. Wrapmanager Inc. raised its stake in shares of Apple by 3.0% in the fourth quarter. Wrapmanager Inc. now owns 54,402 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $13,624,000 after purchasing an additional 1,592 shares during the last quarter. Transcendent Capital Group LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Apple by 3.5% during the fourth quarter. Transcendent Capital Group LLC now owns 45,768 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $11,461,000 after purchasing an additional 1,545 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CWS Financial Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Apple by 0.3% during the fourth quarter. CWS Financial Advisors LLC now owns 65,436 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $16,387,000 after buying an additional 221 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 67.73% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

AAPL has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Evercore ISI upped their target price on shares of Apple from $260.00 to $275.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 18th. Scotiabank downgraded shares of Apple to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday. TD Cowen decreased their target price on shares of Apple from $290.00 to $275.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday. Tigress Financial raised their price target on Apple from $295.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 3rd. Finally, Argus upgraded Apple to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have assigned a hold rating, eighteen have issued a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Apple has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $235.80.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Apple news, CFO Kevan Parekh sold 4,570 shares of Apple stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $206.00, for a total value of $941,420.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 4,569 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $941,214. This trade represents a 50.01 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Timothy D. Cook sold 108,136 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $223.65, for a total transaction of $24,184,616.40. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 3,280,295 shares in the company, valued at $733,637,976.75. This represents a 3.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 187,021 shares of company stock valued at $41,760,140 in the last quarter. 0.06% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Apple Trading Down 3.7 %

Shares of AAPL opened at $205.35 on Monday. Apple Inc. has a 1 year low of $169.21 and a 1 year high of $260.10. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $212.15 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $228.58. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.26, a current ratio of 0.92 and a quick ratio of 0.88. The firm has a market cap of $3.08 trillion, a P/E ratio of 32.60, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.44 and a beta of 1.26.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The iPhone maker reported $1.65 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.62 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $95.36 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $94.04 billion. Apple had a net margin of 24.30% and a return on equity of 160.83%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 5.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.53 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Apple Inc. will post 7.28 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Apple Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 12th will be paid a $0.26 dividend. This is an increase from Apple’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.25. The ex-dividend date is Monday, May 12th. This represents a $1.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.51%. Apple’s payout ratio is presently 15.87%.

Apple announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Thursday, May 1st that authorizes the company to buyback $100.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the iPhone maker to purchase up to 3.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Apple Profile

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.