| By Business Wire |
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| February 7, 2013 03:38 PM EST |
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270 |
By early last year, Apple’s 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.
We remain committed to having an ongoing dialogue with our shareholders
to get perspectives around return of capital and driving shareholder
value.
NOTE TO EDITORS: For additional information visit Apple’s PR website (www.apple.com/pr),
or call Apple’s Media Helpline at (408) 974-2042.
© 2013 Apple Inc. All rights reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, Mac, Mac
OS and Macintosh are trademarks of Apple. Other company and product
names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
