Not only didApple(AAPL)smash first-quarter profit forecasts, it just broke past another S&P 500 threshold: cash. The problem is the company can't get rid of it fast enough — which is costing investors.
The tech sector giant ended the three months ended in March 2021 with cash and investments of $204 billion. That's up nearly 5% in a month and keeps Apple No. 1, by far, in the S&P 500 in terms of cash on hand. Google parentAlphabet(GOOGL) in the communications services sector is a distant No. 2 with $160 billion in cash and investments. AndMicrosoft(MSFT) comes in third with $130 billion, says an Investor's Business Daily analysis of data from S&P Global Market Intelligence andMarketSmith, excluding the financial sector.
Apple's cash pile continues to accumulate, despite aggressive efforts to get rid of it. Talk about a good, but costly, problem to have.
Mounting Piles Of Cash
Mounting cash piles at S&P 500 companies aregetting more attention.
Companies stockpiling cash wasfine with investorsduring the uncertainty of the pandemic. But now, cries for higher dividends and stock buybacks are getting louder. Excluding financials, S&P 500 companies' cash and investments is up this year to more than $2.7 trillion.
"I would expect to see additional (dividend) initiations from (companies) that previously suspended, and increases from some that reduced their rate, dependent on how the economy reacts to the vaccine progress, any new developments with respect to the virus spread and mutants, and any consumer spending reactions," said Howard Silverblatt, index strategist at S&P Dow Jones Indices.
Apple's cash pile is impressive. But it's a costly luxury.
It ended the March quarter with $38.5 billion in cash, $31.4 billion in short-term marketable securities and $134.5 billion in long-term marketable securities. Marketable securities are investments that can be quickly and easily turned into cash. A bulk of Apple's marketable securities are held in U.S. Treasuries.
That's enough to give all 328 million men, women and children in the U.S. $623 apiece.
And that's the criticism. Cash and Treasuries are a bad place to be now. The yield on the 10-Year Treasury is just 1.62%. That's half what it was in 2018.
Apple's cash and investments first topped $200 billion in the fiscal year ended in September 2015. Since then it has aggressively tried to dispense of it. Apple announced plans this week for billions in capital expenditures. It's also raising its stock buyback program by $90 billion. Additionally, it hiked its quarterly dividend by 7% to 22 cents a share. That means Apple yields more than 0.6%, in an sector not known for ahigh yield.
The yield on the Technology Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLK) is 0.8%. That's well below the 1.4% dividend yield of the SPDR S&P 500 (SPY).
What All That Cash Is Costing Apple
Apple continues to print money faster than it can get rid of it. But the opportunity cost of holding so much cash is staggeringly large. A 1.62% yield on $204 billion is just $3.3 billion a year.
Putting that massive amount of money to better use could be highly profitable. That same money invested in Apple's own stock a year ago would have resulted in a gain of $174 billion. Just getting an S&P 500-like long-term return equals $20 billion annually.
So by holding hundreds of billions, Apple investors are losing out on billions. Whatshould you look at before buying Apple stock?
What To Do With All That Cash?
S&P 500 nonfinancial companies are sitting on a record $1.9 trillion in cash alone (excluding investments), says S&P Global Market Intelligence.
Dividends are rising. Investors are also prepping for a big jump in buybacks, too. S&P 500 companies spent $130.6 billion buying back their shares in the fourth quarter of 2020, says S&P Global Market Intelligence. That's up from a recent low of $88.7 billion in the second quarter. Companies are also borrowing less. U.S. companies issued just $192.3 billion in debt in March, down 26% from the same year-ago period.
S&P 500 companies can afford to pay more to investors. Apple is only paying out 22% of earnings as a dividend (prior to its latest dividend hike).IBD Long-Term Leader Microsoftyields just 0.9% and pays out less than 30% of profit. And Alphabet, the No. 2 richest S&P 500 company andLeaderboard member, pays no dividend at all. Should youbuy Alphabet stock now?
When will S&P 500 investors demand to get their cash?