UPDATE: ABG Sundal Collier Downgrades Apple Following Icahn Announcement

In a report published Tuesday, ABG Sundal Collier analyst Per Lindberg downgraded the rating on Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) from Hold to Sell, but reiterated the $400.00 price target.

In the report, ABG Sundal Collier noted, “While Carl Icahn's announcement of a ‘major' investment may inspire hopes of an accelerating buyback programme, we surmise that an apparently increasingly active debate about the capital structure will be overshadowed by the imminent launch of the next batch of iPhones and iPads powered by an entirely new operating system. We anticipate a difficult transition, marred by customer confusion, quality deficiencies and component constraints with Android and WP rivals progressively closing the ‘brand image' gap. In light of recent price appreciation, we downgrade to SELL (Hold) with an unchanged TP of USD 400, of which net cash makes up ~40%, corresponding to 11x our 2015e EPS.”

Apple closed on Friday at $487.22.