Apple Inc. (AAPL) Releases Plans For Shareholder Dividends

Street Insider released a report moments ago, with excerpts from Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s report on plans for cash dividends for this year. Below, we have included those statements.

By early last year, Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL) cash balance had built to a point beyond what we needed to run our business and maintain flexibility to take advantage of strategic opportunities, so we announced a plan to return $45 billion to shareholders over three years. As of next week we will have executed $10 billion of that plan.

We find ourselves in the fortunate position of continuing to generate large amounts of cash, including $23 billion in cash flow from operations in the last quarter alone.

Apple’s management team and Board of Directors have been in active discussions about returning additional cash to shareholders. As part of our review, we will thoroughly evaluate Greenlight Capital’s current proposal to issue some form of preferred stock. We welcome Greenlight’s views and the views of all of our shareholders.

As a part of our efforts to further enhance corporate governance and serve our shareholders’ best interests, Proposal #2 in our proxy includes some recommended changes to our articles of incorporation. These changes were recommended independently of Greenlight’s proposal and would not preclude Apple from adopting their concept. Contrary to Greenlight’s statements, adoption of Proposal #2 would not prevent the issuance of preferred stock. Currently, Apple’s articles of incorporation provide for the issuance of “blank check” preferred stock by the Board of Directors without shareholder approval. If Proposal #2 is adopted, our shareholders would have the right to approve the issuance of preferred stock. As such, Proposal #2 has the support of many of our shareholders.

It appears that Apple has had a very profitable year, despite the plummet of its share price from $705 in September, to its current trading value of $468 per share. Tim Cook is planning on passing the profit along to shareholders, and that appears to be garnering support. Perhaps we will soon see Apple begin to rise back towards its prestigious place at the top of the world's most valuable companies list.