Market Update: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) – EU competition chief says unclear when Apple tax probe will be decided

[Reuters – UK Focus] – A two-year investigation into whether Apple’s tax deal with Irish authorities gave the iPhone maker an unfair advantage will take a lot longer because of the large amount of data involved, the EU antitrust chief said on Monday. The European Commission accused Ireland (Other OTC: IRLD – news) in 2014 of dodging international tax rules by letting Apple shelter profits worth tens of billions of dollars from tax collectors in return for maintaining jobs. Read more on this. Apple Inc. (AAPL) , currently valued at $618.11B, opened this morning at $110.41. Shares have traded today between $110.27 and $112.19 per share with the price of the stock fluctuating between $92.00 to $134.54 over the last 52 weeks. Priced at 12.11x this year’s forecasted earnings, AAPL shares are relatively expensive compared to the industry’s 7.63x forward p/e ratio. The company pays shareholders $2.08 per share in dividend income per year, for a current yield of 1.91%. Consensus earnings for the current quarter by the 36 sell-side analysts covering the stock is an estimate of $1.99 per share, which would be $0.34 worse than the year-ago quarter and a $0.40 sequential decrease. The full-year EPS estimate is $9.08, which would be a $0.14 better than last year. The quarterly earnings estimate is predicated on a consensus revenue forecast of $52.04 Billion. If reported, that would be a 10.29% decrease over the year-ago quarter. More recently, Cowen upgraded AAPL from Market Perform to Outperform (Mar 30, 2016). Previously, BofA/Merrill upgraded AAPL from Neutral to Buy. With the above information in mind, readers should note that the average price target is $134.35, which is 21.68% above where the stock opened this morning. See more in (NASDAQ:AAPL) Similar Articles: Stock Update: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) – Will Qualcomm Lose Out on Apple’s iPhone? (QCOM, AAPL) Market Update (NASDAQ:AAPL): Apple’s Big Problem With The Apple Watch Must Be Fixed Company Update: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) – Apple Names Jeff Williams Chief Operating Officer