Tag: price

Icahn tries to talk up Apple shares

Posted on February 12, 2015 by - News, Opinions

Carl_IcahnThe Tame Apple Press has teamed up with Apple shareholder Carl Ichan to see if they can talk up the price of Jobs’ Mob shares.

Icahn who owns pots of Apple shares thinks that they should be making him pots more cash – and what better way to do that than claim that they are undervalued.

Of course a shareholder thinking he should get more money for his stash is not news, but the Tame Apple Press seems to have decided to give him a leg up while promoting the value of their favourite toymaker.

Reuters, which is set to eclipse the New York Times as Apple’s favourite Public Relations expert, actually ran a story this morning where Ichan claimed that the iPhone maker’s stock should be trading at $216, far above its record high of $124.92 yesterday.

“At $216 per share, Apple – already the world’s most valuable company – would be worth about $1.3 trillion, or about the size of South Korea’s gross domestic product,” Reuters’  breathlessly said.

The company is valued at just over $700 billion currently.

Icahn said Apple should be trading at 20 times earnings per share, which taken together with net cash of $22 per share works out to $216 per share.  He didn’t say why he thought that, other than the fact that if he can convince enough thicko’s out there he is right, the share price will go up and he will be laughing all the way to the bank.

He added that if Apple introduces a TV in FY 2016 or FY 2017, we believe this “20X multiple is conservative.”   Apple TV, the Tame Apple Press had not heard that one.  It is also unlikely to be a big money spinner. The TV market is down the loo at the moment and there are plenty of nice looking Tellies out there sitting on shelves.  Jobs Mob is also yet to come up with a future proof idea since its Tablet fad started to die out.

To be fair Icahn, who is  Apple’s top 10 investors, does not only think he can convince people that the shares are worth more.  He thinks Apple should buy back more shares and raise its dividend.

Apple had cash reserves of about $178 billion as of December 27 and said last April it would return more than $130 billion to shareholders by the end of 2015.

Still Ichan’s alliance with the Tame Apple Press did make him a little richer.  Apple shares closed 2.3 percent higher at $124.88.

AMD slashes prices

Posted on August 21, 2014 by - News

The_Pit_and_the_Pendulum_(1961_film)_posterAMD appears to have been going on a campaign of price cutting to take out  Intel’s Core i5 “Devil’s Canyon”.

According to Xbit Labs,  Intel wants to cut prices of its AMD FX-9000 “Centurion” microprocessors in a bid to make them more competitive “Devil’s Canyon” and several other chips from its rival.

AMD has also slightly reduced prices of other FX-series chips and culled some older and lower-end models.

From September 1, 2014, AMD’s FX-9370, with eight cores, 4.40/4.70GHz, 8MB L2 cache, 8MB L3 cache, 220W thermal design power will cost $199 .  The  top-of-the-range FX-9590, eight cores, 4.70/5.0GHz, 8MB L2 cache, 8MB L3 cache, 220W thermal design power will set you back $215.

The prices of the FX-9370 and the FX-9590 will be cut by 23 percent and 28 percent, respectively. Given the minimal difference between pricing of the FX-9370 and the FX-9590.

AMD has promised to cut the prices of “mainstream” FX-series chips slightly on the 1st of September to make them more competitive.

The company said that it will discontinue or will not change the price of many older AMD FX central processing units, including FX-8150, FX-8120, FX-6200, FX-6100, FX-4170, FX-4130 and FX-4100.

Centurion was AMD’s attempt to deal with the launch of Haswell. AMD released two “extreme” FX-class central processing units code-named “Centurion”, which are compatible with advanced AM3+ mainboards and require sophisticated cooling systems. Initially the FX-9370 and the FX-9590 chips were only available to select system integrators and cost up to $800-$900 per unit.

It had been expected that AMD would introduce all-new AMD FX-9000-series “Centurion” microprocessors with increased clock-rates, but it looks like the price cut will make them look better against Intel’s Core i5-4690K “Devil’s Canyon”.

 

PCKeeper lets customers pick their own price

Posted on June 7, 2013 by - News

buckguardA software outfit called PCKeeper has come up with a novel way of flogging its product.

It’s not setting a sale price – instead letting the customer decide what they want to pay.

The company said that it is experimenting with the same idea which allows for musicians and artists to allow their fans to pay what they want for music or art.

It is a radical concept for software because companies usually fear not getting their development costs back.

In this case it took a team of nearly 150 people almost two years to create and support the program so they want to make their money back.

The software normally has a retail price of $39.99 but will be available to customers for as low as $1.00. The idea is being tested out between June and July and it is not clear if it is just a marketing gimmick or if the company really is serious about it as a long term option.

PCKeeper’s communications manager, Ilias Melikov, said that letting people choose their own price is an interesting way to open up the product to consumers who price shop and also build trust with those customers once they use the software and see just how useful it is.

Still, even if the idea is canned after a month it could create regular users.