Apple Make $24 Billion From Winning The NFL's Thursday Night Football Rights

Last August, I argued here that Apple had wasted $130 billion in stock buybacks and dividends over the past 3 years.

The stock has gained about $18/share since September 2012. That’s a total gain of about 19% vs. the Nasdaq which has done 63% over the same period.

What was the point?

Had Apple done nothing with this misguided notion that their stock price would increase if they gave money to their shareholders, today Apple would have $330 billion in cash (vs. $200 bililon) and no debt (vs. $60 billion). And the stock price would be about the same (I know that all the Apple fans will write me or comment that I’m wrong because I’m arguing a hypothetical. I’ve explained elsewhere why the stock price would be the same, so I’m not going to get into it here again).

In my prior Forbes post, I said that Apple should have used that $130 billion to do lots of M&A. I said the reason why they probably didn’t was because they were worried the government was going to wrap them up in antitrust red tape the way Microsoft and Google were caught up in.

Well, here’s a use of cash that Apple should be following up on right now, with no concerns for anti-trust. They don’t have $330 billion in cash on hand, but they do have $200 billion sitting around. Apple should outbid all the broadcast networks and cable companies and win the exclusive rights to the NFL Thursday Night Football package which is available right now, as described this morning by Peter Kafka. Apple could pay $4 billion for a 5 year package and still make boatloads of money from it. Here’s how.