Apple lifted by Carl Icahn investment, Samsung court ruling
Apple (AAPL) stock got a boost on Wednesday from an increased stake by activist investor Carl Icahn and a favorable court ruling vs. nemesis Samsung Electronics. Icahn revealed that he has purchased $500 million worth of Apple (AAPL) stock in the past two weeks, bringing his total holdings in the company to more than $3 billion. He disclosed the purchases on his Twitter account. He also repeated his call for Apple management to take greater steps to return cash to shareholders. Icahn said Apple’s board is doing a “great disservice” to shareholders by not significantly increasing its stock buybacks. He said he plans to write an “in-depth letter” on the subject soon. He noted that Apple has been a great investment for him so far. “Since tweeting about our large position in $AAPL on Aug. 13, when the stock was 468 per share, we’ve kept buying shares of this ‘no brainer,'” he wrote. Apple stock was up a fraction, near 552, in afternoon trading on the stock market today. Apple also won a court ruling in its long-running patent infringement case against Samsung, Foss Patents reported. Federal Judge Lucy Koh of the Northern District of California ruled late Tuesday that Samsung is infringing on one of Apple’s patents involving the auto-complete feature on a smartphone keyboard. Apple holds the rights to showing both the word that has been typed as well as the suggested auto-completion at the same time. She also declared invalid a Samsung patent on multimedia synchronization.