I bought some AAPL shares at around $247 a couple of weeks ago when the antennagate was a hot issue and adversely affecting the AAPL stock. Then Steve Jobs held a conference, and started talking about “this scandal” (he even mentioned the Bloomberg rumor and called it a crock). He demonstrated that the problem was not only in the iphone 4, but in all other smartphones when held in certain ways. I don’t think that was a wise thing to do, because other smartphones will obviously retaliate (and they did).

Another unwise thing was mentioning investors worrying when the stock goes down or up $5, saying that “he doesn’t need them”. Well, guess what, these are the majority of investors. Capital is a chicken, it will run away with the slightest sign of danger.

Anyway, Steve Jobs offered a bugs bunny fix (free bumper/cover or whatever for the iphone) to fix the problem. The market breathed again and the stock went up $4, and then went down another $4, within minutes. Why did that happen? Clearly it was something that Steve Jobs said. I don’t know what it was, but I didn’t like his attitude towards the investors, and he wasn’t also guaranteeing a fix. Obviously the problem is with the design, and there might be also a software problem with the calculation of the reception bars.

Anyway, my opinion about this whole antennagate story is that it’s nothing, I have a Nokia phone and if I hold it differently I have different reception, why should the iphone be any different? Or better? Why should it be judged by higher standards? The story was there so that some people who shorted the stock at around $280 would make some serious cash.

But there is something that scares me about AAPL, when I saw the press conference that Steve Jobs did on youtube, I saw how weak, physically weak he was. See I think what made the stock drop back (the $4 swing) was the question about his health, someone asked him, “how is your health”, his answer was that it was good.

The problem with Apple is that the whole vision of the company is centered in one person, at least this is what the market believes (remember the last few months of 2008 when the stock went to down almost 50% on his health concerns?). Bloomberg even published an obituary for Steve Jobs (Bloomberg people really hate Apple btw, or they were just playing with the stock). There are many rumors stating that Steve Jobs is involved in every process of every product design.

Apple is always a buy, but as long as Steve Jobs is alive and healthy, but if he dies, the stock will sharply decline, probably forever. And if he gets sick, the stock will drop for months (the last time it was about 6 months). My manager once told me, a company where not everyone is replaceable is not a company. Is Steve Jobs replaceable? Is Apple a company?