Investors yawn at Apple confab
Shares typically lackluster, despite all the gushing
Shares typically dip during Worldwide Developers Conference.
The Apple faithful have been breathlessly awaiting the company’s latest announcements at its confab that started Monday. But investors know better — it’s a bust.
Investors know to ignore the gushing about all things Apple during the Worldwide Developers Conference, or WWDC, which typically takes place this time of year. Shares of the company have fallen 3.7%, on average, during these events the past 10 years.
Don’t blame the market, either. Shares of Apple amid the meeting lagged the market by a meaningful 4 percentage points during the period, according to a USA TODAY analysis of data from S&P Capital IQ.
The underperformance of Apple stock during WWDC week is no fluke, either. Apple shares have fallen in each and every of the WWDC weeks the past 10 years — except for last year, when it rose 2%, while the benchmark Standard & Poor’s 500 index gained 0.6%. Sell the news!
Expect lots of coverage of the company’s annual meeting for developers, where Apple courts programmers to build applications for its ecosystem.
It’s an event where the company draws an impressive amount of publicity to behindthe-scenes developments like updates to operating systems and sometimes yet another update to the company’s hardware.
Tickets usually sell out quickly. Shares of Apple are up nearly 18% this year — topping the market’s 1.7% gain.
But to investors — Apple’s WWDC hoopla is a giant yawn. The worst performance of Apple stock during WWDC week was 2008, the year the company launched an app store for its smartphone and tablet devices. Investors were unimpressed, sending shares down 7.1% — while the market was flat that week.
Maybe Apple is finally breaking the WWDC stock curse? Shares of the company rose during last year’s confab by 2% — beating the market’s 1.3% gain.
Monday, on the first day of the conference, Apple shares fell 0.7% to $127.80 — roughly equal with the drop in the S&P 500.
But the message over the long term is clear: Investors have learned to tune out WWDC.