Apple shares set all-time high on rumors of upcoming product release

Apple shares surged one percent to hit an all-time high of $141.46 at the end of trading on Monday following reports that the company's first hardware releases of 2017 could launch as early as Tuesday morning.

The close caps off a day of rally trading that started at $140.44 before reaching a mid-day high of just over $141 two hours later. Shares continue to gather steam as of this writing, with AAPL sitting at $141.56 in after hours trading.

A series of rumored new product launches are thought to be driving the stock's performance. Apple in an update to its system status page earlier today revealed the company's online storefront is set to undergo maintenance early tomorrow. The downtime sparked speculation that Apple is preparing to make space for a new product, perhaps a minor low-end iPad refresh or a rumored 128-gigabyte iPhone SE.

According to a report last week, Apple is slated to launch new devices this week without the usual keynote presentation. Since a media event is not planned, minor product refreshes are anticipated.

Beyond tomorrow's supposed product launch, Apple is widely expected to unveil this year's iPad Pro collection in the coming days or weeks. Headlining for 2017 is a rumored 10.5-inch iPad Pro model that would stuff a thin-bezel display into a form factor just slightly larger than the current 9.7-inch iPad Pro.

An updated 12.9-inch iPad Pro is also anticipated, as is a less expensive 9.7-inch variant that could take the place of iPad Air 2 at the bottom of Apple's lineup.

Apple stock is on a roll going into 2017. Today's all-time high follows a string of record-breaking trading days set over the past five weeks. AAPL's first record day of 2017 came on Feb. 13 when the stock hit a high of $133.29. Shares climbed $135.01 a day later as Apple's market capitalization exceeded $700 billion for the first time since 2015.

Company shares received another bump in late February when financial guru Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway quadrupled its investment in Apple to more than 57 million shares at the end of 2016. Buffet later revealed his firm purchased about 120 million AAPL shares since Jan. 1, bringing the total up to 133 million shares worth more than $17 billion.