Two interesting milestones reached tonight.
1 – For the second time this year (see Apple recovers lost ground) Apple has recovered all the ground lost this year. On 31st Dec 12, Apple closed at $532 but had slumped to $390 by 19th Apr 13.
Tonight Apple closed at $533. So they have again made up all the ground lost in 2013. Indeed, up 36% since their 2013 low. But still 24% off the $702 high they hit in Sept 12.
2 – NASDAQ finally closed at over 4000 (4021 to be precise) - up 34% YTD. It was last at 4
000 on 11th Apr 2000 – over 13 years ago. NASDAQ reached its all time high of 5048 on 10th Mar 2000 – so it is still c25% off that high. Conversely it had slumped to 1172 by Jul 2002. So it has risen by nearly 250% in 11 years.
Putting the two together, Apple was at just $31 on 10th Mar 2000 when NASDAQ was at its high. Indeed Apple had slumped to a millennium low of $7 by Dec 2000.Anyone lucky enough to buy Apple at that point would be showing a 76x profit! Thus proving that index tracking is no substitute to astute stock-picking!
Where now? I’m an observer rather than a pundit. My ‘observation’ is that there are very few pundits suggesting a crash in either NASDAQ or Apple in the very near term. Indeed ‘the bulls have it’ right now. But, let’s face it, there are still many ‘unknown unknowns’ out there to spook any market. But for the moment ‘let the good times roll’.