Cramer: Apple, Microsoft, Meta prove stock picking works — SkimNews
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- Retail investors now account for up to 20% of stock trading volume, up from 10% a couple decades ago, yet Cramer says they're routinely dismissed as "first-class idiots" for picking individual stocks over S&P 500 funds.
- Berkshire Hathaway's outperformance came largely from its Apple position, acquired in 2016 after Warren Buffett saw kids glued to iPhones at a Berkshire-owned Dairy Queen, according to Buffett's own telling.
- Tim Cook stepped down as Apple CEO on Sept. 1 to become executive chairman, handing the CEO job to longtime hardware chief John Ternus; the foldable iPhone Duo goes on preorder Oct. 16 and hits stores a week later.
- Apple secured an unusual AI arrangement in which Alphabet covers the costs of Gemini integration and the power infrastructure — a deal Cramer calls "one of the most amazing coups, ever."
- Microsoft — first spotted by Cramer in 1985 via Harvard roommate Steve Ballmer — bought LinkedIn for $26 billion (closed December 2016) and Activision Blizzard for $69 billion (closed October 2023), and holds a large stake in OpenAI.
- Copilot reached 30 million users despite initial Wall Street derision, while OpenAI — the company Microsoft backs — has been "fickle to the point of being erratic," Cramer writes.
- The CNBC Investing Club portfolio has held Apple, Microsoft, and Meta since January 2022, with Cramer citing all three as proof that concentrated stock picking beats diluted S&P 500 strategies.
Why it matters: Cramer, whose CNBC Investing Club portfolio has held Apple, Microsoft, and Meta since January 2022, makes a public case that concentrating on individual winners beats diluted S&P 500 strategies. With retail now driving up to 20% of trading volume, his framing gives self-directed investors a high-profile counter-narrative to the dominant index-only advice from the financial press.
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