European Union antitrust regulators say the company may have breached competition rules
The shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) are up 2.1% at $350.22 this morning, despite European Union (EU) antitrust regulators opening investigations into the tech giant's app store and rules mandating the use of Apple Pay, its own purchasing system. Regulators are investigating alleged access restriction for rival products on Apple devices, citing the iPhone maker may have breached competition rules. In response, Apple accused a few companies of filing groundless complaints and criticized EU antitrust regulators for paying them mind. "It's disappointing the European Commission is advancing baseless complaints from a handful of companies who simply want a free ride," Apple said in a statement.
A bull note out of Citi could be keeping the equity afloat. The analyst lifted its price target to $400 from $310, predicting an upcoming 5G iPhone reveal this coming September. The brokerage bunch is already overwhelmingly optimistic on the equity, with 20 of the 25 sporting a "buy" or better recommendation, while the remaining five call it a "hold" or worse. Meanwhile, the 12-month consensus target price of $323.98 is a 7.6% discount to current levels.
That sentiment has carried through to the options pits, where the appetite for calls is unusually high. In the last 10 days, 1.71 calls were bought for every put at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Cboe Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX). This ratio sits higher than 84% of readings from the past year, meaning calls are being picked up at a faster-than-usual clip.
On the charts, AAPL remains unscathed. Though shares dropped in mid-March to the $212 level, the equity has fully recovered to reach an all-time high of $354.77 on June 10. This is comparatively higher to its pre-pandemic peak near the $327 mark. With consistent support at the 20-day-moving average since April, AAPL now sports a whopping 80% year-over-year lead.