Company Update (NASDAQ:AAPL): Apple plans to offer subscription content through News app

[Reuters] – The move would differentiate Apple News from Facebook’s (FB.O) Instant Articles news offering, which does not offer subscriber-only content, and would likely give Apple a boost as it seeks to distinguish itself from a growing crowd of online news apps. The move comes as news publishers try to figure out how to work with Apple and Facebook Inc (FB.O), which are important distributors of news content to their hundreds of millions of users, but at the same time are getting between publishers and their readers. By making paid content available through its News app, Apple would give publishers a way to maintain relationships with readers and perhaps attract new subscribers. Read more on this. Apple Inc. (AAPL) , currently valued at $555.34B, opened at $99.50. Looking at today’s market, AAPL one day range is $98.07 to $100.79 with the price of the stock fluctuating between $92.00 to $134.54 over the last 52 weeks. Priced at 10.49x this year’s forecasted earnings, AAPL shares are relatively expensive compared to the industry ’s 7.89x forward p/e ratio. And for those looking to make a return holding the stock, the company pays shareholders $2.08 per share annually in dividends, yielding 2.05%. In a review of the consensus earnings estimate this quarter, 39 sell-side analysts are looking at $3.23 per share, which would be $0.17 better than the year-ago quarter and a $0.02 sequential decrease. The full-year EPS estimate is $9.48 which would be a $0.26 improvement than last year’s full-year earnings. The quarterly earnings estimate is based on a consensus revenue forecast of the current quarter of $76.59 Billion. If realized, that would be a 2.67% increase over the year-ago quarter. More recently, BofA/Merrill upgraded AAPL from Neutral to Buy (Jan 12, 2016). Previously, Mizuho upgraded AAPL from Neutral to Buy. Investors should keep in mind is that the average price target is $142.67, which is 43.39% above where the stock opened this morning. See more in (NASDAQ:AAPL) Similar Articles: Company Update (NASDAQ:AAPL): Here are the Albany banks that offer Apple, Samsung, Android Pay Market Update: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) – Apple hits out at British plans to extend online surveillance Stock Update: Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) – Apple News: Apple Pay Adds Card Issuers, BMW Will Have CarPlay, iPhone 7 Rumors