by , 2:00 PM EDT, October 10th, 2008
Oppenheimer analyst Yair Reiner thinks that Apple's stock [AAPL] has hit rock bottom. While he adjusted his target price down from $213 to $145, he made a strong case for the stock in a note in investors on Friday.
"To put Apple's current valuation in perspective, on a trailing cash flow basis, it's trading in line with the historic trough multiples of HPQ and DELL," he wrote. "You have to look back to the darkest days of 2001 - pre-iPod - to find Apple's multiple this beleaguered."
Mr. Reiner noted that Apple's cash on hand has now reached US$23 billion. If the global economy doesn't "plunge into a hall of horrors," Mr. Reiner expects Apple to continue to grow and outperform thanks to the continued migration from Windows to Macs, the iPhone, and ""a global Halo 2.0 effect that's bringing iPhone users into the Mac fold."Over at Piper Jaffray, analyst Gene Munster told his investors earlier this week that he expects to see price cuts on the new Apple notebooks of 9 to 18 percent on October 14, with meaningful upgrades.
In afternoon trading, AAPL was at US$95.96, up $7.22 for the day.