Apple still a top pick in 2006?
AppleInsider StaffAlthough some investors believe the easy money has already been made, research and investment firm PiperJaffray said it sees further potential in Apple's business and lists the company's stock as one of its top three picks for the new year.
Apple
"Why, despite the run in Apple, are we highlighting the name as a top pick?," analyst Gene Munster wrote in a research note released on Wednesday. "Investors believe the easy money has been made, but we see more upside potential in Apple's business, and sentiment suggesting that growth has peaked leads us to believe that Apple shares will respond positively to any outperformance."
While Munster does not expect to see a slowdown of new and updated iPods in 2006, he believes a more important story will be the evolution of the Macintosh line in the new year. The analyst expects the move to Intel processors and the need for new Mac form factors to lead to the launch of several new and updated models that will generate consumer interest.
Adobe
Commenting on Adobe, Munster said the company's customer base — which now includes that of Macromedia — is as strong as he has seen it.
While the general consensus on the Street is that 2006 will be a slow product release year for Adobe, the analyst believes Adobe will benefit from the recently released Adobe/Macromedia bundled products, Acrobat 8 in late summer/early fall, sporadic releases of various new enterprise-level product combinations, and anticipation for a shipment of CS 3 in early 2007.
Avid
Of PiperJaffray's top three top picks, Munster said Avid likely has the highest risk profile, with more quarter-to-quarter volatility in results than either Adobe or Apple.
"That said, the company is in a leadership position in the markets for high definition post production and broadcast newsroom systems, both of which are in the midst of major multi-year industry upgrade cycles," the analyst wrote.
PiperJaffray maintains an "Outperform" rating on Apple shares with a target price of $80.
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Mike Wuerthele and Malcolm Owen
40 Comments
"Apple still a top pick in 2006?"
Is anyone truly surprised? I'm not.
This is another case of AI "journalism" run amok. There should be no question mark in the subject. The headline should be:
"Firm: Apple still a top pick in 2006"
And now there are rumors of Apple's next Final Cut digging more into Avid territory.
(The question mark doesn't bother me. It's a top pick for SOME analysts. Not for all. So is it a top pick for you?)
Well, I'm not selling my 10,000 shares yet.
If Thinksecret is correct, Avid could be on a rocky ride. It would depend upon how polished their (Apple) new versions would be, as well as how well the hardware supports it.
A new version of the PM Quad G5 in March? That would lend strength to the idea that Apple will wait until 2007 to replace it with an x86 line. Otherwise, I can't see Apple wasting their resources on PPC development of such a huge project.
I've been planning on putting my purchase of a Quad on hold, because of possible pushing up of the x86 version. I figured what we saw at Macworld would let us know how fast Apple would be moving on that. But, now I don't know.
I guess it's wait 'till march. I will get the FCP Studio 6 upgrade, but not the Extreme.
So this is off-topic, but the think secret blurb would seem to strongly indicate that the powermac line will go at least 2 of 3 models being quads (maybe all three but that seems less likely) by the spring.