Monday, May 12,2008 @ 11:15am
AmTech: Stock may go higher based on iPhone deals
Apple's stock is likely to go higher than expected based on a spate of iPhone agreements the company has forged, says analyst Shaw Wu of American Technology Research. In recent weeks deals have been confirmed with Telecom Italia, Vodafone and several other carriers, offering the potential of a dramatically increased iPhone subscriber base. Wu in fact suggests that the potential market could "more than triple" in 2008, from 150 million people to approximately 470 million.
AmTech is predicting that Apple will ship 11 million iPhones during 2008 -- beating the official target of 10 million -- and another 17 million in 2009. The market for unlocked devices is expected to support this, but as an increasing diminished factor, since there will be less incentive to hack and customers should become increasingly "mainstream," rather than tech-savvy early adopters.
Wu says that AmTech is raising its FY08 EPS estimate from $5.25 to $5.27, and its FY09 estimate from $6.15 to $6.40. The price target for stock is being pushed from $210 to $220, based on 33x of a CY09 EPS of $6.70, or 31x of net cash and interest income.