With the U.S economy entering a strange patch called “No one knows if there’s a recession or not right now,” investors are looking to protect their money and their way of life. That’s what made Jefferies such a hot topic when it declared that Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) would remain a “source of safety” for investors, even in these unusual times. Yet, even as Jefferies told investors to seek safety in Apple, Apple was down fractionally at the time of writing.
The word came from Jefferies analyst Andrew Uerkwitz. Uerkwitz declared Apple to be the most “boring” of the buy stocks on his list, which is a far cry from the image Apple built itself upon as a wild innovator. But Uerkwitz made it clear why Apple was boring; over the last few years, it’s made for an extremely consistent stock. It has little presence in cloud systems or artificial intelligence, but rather, offers simple, useful services and solid, readily-replaced hardware.
Of course, not even Apple is a perfect source of security. Recently, Apple, along with Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) got hit with a fine of around $218 million from the Spanish National Markets and Competition Commission. The fine was for collusion of Apple devices, and noted that contracts in Spain amid the two companies featured several portions that would restrict competition and, to a certain extent, control which devices were sold in Spain.
Analysts seem to expect a safe harbor in Apple as well. With 24 Buy ratings to seven Hold, Apple stock is considered a Strong Buy by analyst consensus. Further, with an average price target of $193.57, Apple stock offers a very narrow upside potential of just 0.58%.
