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It makes sense for Apple to release a cheaper iPhone, Morgan Stanley analysts believe. For example, the release of the iPad Mini tablet expanded Apple's customer base in China and Brazil: the iPad Mini accounted for 50% of purchases there. In addition, Chinese users wanted

Apple

Manufacturer of electronics and software. Shareholders: almost 100% of shares in free circulation, largest investors are Blackrock (5.26%), Fidelity Management & Research (4.91%), Vanguard Group (4.48%). Capitalization is $423.3 billion. Financial indicators (fiscal year ended September 29, 2012): revenue - $156.5 billion, net profit - $41.7 billion.

Apple may return more money to shareholders because its cash reserves have increased by $40 billion since March 2012, Morgan Stanley's Katie Huberty wrote in a research note. Morgan Stanley analysts received these figures at a meeting with Apple's CFO Peter Oppenheimer. Apple has $137 billion in its accounts, and if it pays out $28 billion to shareholders by the end of 2013, it will reach the IT sector average of 68% of free cash flow going to dividends, Huberty wrote.

A significant portion of Apple's funds are in banks in other countries, which makes the company less flexible - a problem Huberty suggests solving by taking out a loan at a low interest rate. Borrowing money to pay dividends is a good idea, says Bernstein analyst Tony Sakonaghi (quoted by Fortune). He has been persuading Apple's board of directors to agree to pay dividends since 2008, when its available funds did not exceed $30 billion. "Huberty means that Apple keeps its $137 billion in offshore accounts, so it cannot simply transfer it to the US and pay investors: in this case, it faces serious taxes, writes Cult of Mac publisher journalist John Brownlee. It is more profitable for the company to borrow money in the US. Apple finds itself in an interesting situation: being one of the richest companies on Earth, it is forced to borrow money, Brownlee says ironically.

Companies in the high-tech sector, even with significant reserves of funds in their accounts (like Google), also issue debt instruments, says Mikhail Sokolov, director of the investment banking division of Barclays. This is due to the optimization of the management of funds: most of them can be in offshore zones and it is better to save them for large acquisitions, and for current corporate needs to borrow money on debt markets, taking advantage of the period of exceptionally low interest rates, advises Sokolov.

The dividend issue arose in early February, when David Einhorn, president of the hedge fund Greenlight Capital, filed a lawsuit in New York federal court against Apple, demanding that it increase its shareholder payout. Greenlight Capital is an $8 billion fund that owns about 1.5 million Apple shares, worth about $670 million. Einhorn sought to block Apple’s proposal that preferred shares be issued only with the approval of a shareholder meeting. He argued that such a clause in Apple’s charter would limit the company’s choice of tools to share some of its cash with shareholders.

Last Friday, Einhorn proposed that Apple issue perpetual preferred shares that pay a fixed dividend yield of 4%, instead of the current 2.3% for common shares. He even came up with a name for these new shares: iPrefs. But Apple's move appears to be beating investors' expectations: The dividend yield will now more than double to 6%, according to Morgan Stanley. Apple CEO Tim Cook has previously said that the dividend issue is being seriously discussed by the company's board of directors.

Investors are unhappy with how Apple's capitalization is falling. A year ago, at the end of February 2012, it exceeded $500 billion. And in August 2012, Apple became the most expensive company in history, beating the previous record set in December 1999 by Microsoft - $620.58 billion. On September 21, Apple shares reached a price maximum during trading - $705.07 per share, which corresponded to the capitalization of the entire company at $662.1 billion. Last Friday, Apple's capitalization was only $423.3 billion.

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