14 DAY TRIAL // Founded back in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations, widely known as NASDAQ, is an American electronic stock exchange that trades more shares per day than any other US market and has approximately 3,200 companies listed. Obviously, one of them is Apple, having the AAPL symbol. All fine so far, but it seems that if things go bad, Apple may not be listed by NASDAQ anymore. How's that possible?
First of all, last June, irregularities in Apple's stock option grants were revealed, and six months later, the company took an 84,000,000$ charge, according to the US Securities and Exchange Comission (SEC), and it seems that, at this time, the company is going to delay its financial reporting once more.
Unfortunately, we're not talking about rumors here, since Apple warned about the fact that the company could be removed from the Nasdaq Global Select Market, a market started last July that comprises only about one third of the companies listed on the NASDAQ exchange.
Also, they acknowledged for the first time that a federal investigation into its stock option practices is on the way. In a regulatory filing issued last week, Apple said that: "The resolution of these matters will be time consuming, expensive and will distract management from the conduct of the company’s business. Furthermore, if the company is subject to adverse findings in litigation, regulatory proceedings or government enforcement actions, the company could be required to pay damages or penalties to have other remedies imposed, which could harm its business, financial condition, results of operations and cashflows.", but the worst part is that they also noted that this story could "subject the company to a potential delisting from the Nasdaq Global Select Market".
All I can say at this time is that I will keep my fingers crossed and hope everything works well in the end. After all, it would be a pity for Apple to lose that extra degree of respectability and confidence given by this listing, especially since 2007 is going to be a really interesting year for them in term of product releases and potential of market growth.