Apple mega-investor Icahn, CEO Tim Cook to talk buyback over dinner

Investor Carl Icahn revealed plans to have dinner with Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook to discuss the “magnitude� of the company’s stock buyback.

Icahn disclosed the planned meeting in a post Thursday on Twitter.

“Spoke to Tim,� Icahn tweeted. “Planning dinner in September. Tim believes in buyback and is doing one. What will be discussed is magnitude.�

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The latest update comes a little more than a week after Icahn revealed he had bought about $1 billion in Apple stock. Investors cheered that news last week and sent Apple’s stock soaring.

Icahn’s goal is to get Apple to increase its $60-billion stock buyback program, announced this year.

Though the buyback is already the largest in history, Icahn wants to see it go as high as $150 billion, according to some reports. He argues that Apple can well afford a bigger buyback that would in turn boost the company’s stock even further.

The latest tweet didn’t indicate whether Apple’s management was inclined to agree to his request. But his $1-billion investment apparently at least bought him dinner with the CEO.

Icahn’s tweet came during a three-hour shutdown of stock trading on Nasdaq. Investors noted the aggressive investor’s news but had to wait until nearly the end of the trading day to act on it.

Before the outage, Apple’s stock price was down $3.83 to $498.53. But after trading resumed Apple finished the day at $502.96, up 60 cents.

Apple shares have been on a monster run this summer, but have cooled off a bit this week.

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