Apple Still Sweet

John Ransom | September 30, 2014 2:22 PM

Welcome to John Ransom’s Stocks in the News where the headlines meet the trendlines.

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Stock number one: Ebay

EBay will spin off PayPal, giving in to Carl Icahn-- LA Times

Online marketplace EBay Inc. is bowing to investor pressure by spinning off its payment business PayPal into a separate publicly-traded company by 2015.

Wall Street cheered the news Tuesday and pushed up shares of EBay by 6.8% to $56.24 in morning trading.

The move is a sharp reversal for the San Jose company, which had spent months fighting activist shareholder Carl Icahn, who had argued both businesses would benefit from a split.

Symbol: EBAY

Trailing PE: NA; Forward PE: 17

PEG: 1.41

Dividend: NA

Estimate Trend: Down

Ransom Note Trendline: Hold Ebay

Stock number two: Teekay Corporation

Why Deutsche Bank Upgraded Teekay --Barron's

Shares of Teekay (TK) have surged more than 15% this morning after the shipping company announced a new dividend policy after yesterday’s close. Deutsche Bank’s Amit Mehrotra think the news is good enough to be worthy of an upgrade for Teekay.

Symbol: TK

Apple Pay and some of the other services stand out against PayPal for a key reason. Right out of the gate, Apple Pay is ready for consumers to make transactions with their mobile devices at different merchants. That mobile-ready aspect is an area where PayPal, which has roots as a facilitator of payments through websites, hasn't been as dominant. EBay has made acquisitions to help speed the transition, including paying $800 million for mobile-payments startup Braintree last year.

Symbol: AAPL

Trailing PE: 16; Forward PE: 14

PEG: 1.30

Dividend: 2.00

Estimate Trend: Up

Ransom Note Trendline: Buy Apple