Business Highlights

By The Associated Press

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Investor sues Apple, wants more cash

NEW YORK (AP) ⿿ With its annual meeting looming and its stock on the decline, Apple is facing a rebellion from an influential investor who wants the company to stop stockpiling cash and give it to shareholders instead.

Greenlight Capital said Thursday that it is suing Apple in a New York federal court over the company's proposal to eliminate the possibility of issuing preferred stock. David Einhorn, who heads the investment fund, said the proposal would close down one avenue for Apple to reward shareholders with more cash.

Apple is still the world's most valuable company, but its stock has lost 35 percent of its value since September, as it's become obvious that its once-rapid growth has slowed down. The company is fabulously profitable and is sitting on a huge $137 billion cash reserve. Wall Street wants the company to share more of that money with its shareholders rather than tucking it away in low-yielding bank accounts.

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NTSB: 787 battery approval should be reconsidered

WASHINGTON (AP) ⿿ The government should reassess its safety approval of the Boeing 787 lithium ion batteries, the nation's top accident investigator said Thursday, casting doubt on whether the airliner's troubles can be quickly remedied.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating last month's battery fire in a Japan Airlines 787 "Dreamliner" while it was parked in Boston. The results so far contradict some of the assumptions that were made about the battery's safety at the time the system won government approval, said the board's chairman, Deborah Hersman.

The investigation shows the fire started with multiple short-circuits in one of the battery's eight cells, she said. That created an uncontrolled chemical reaction known as "thermal runaway," which is characterized by progressively hotter temperatures. That spread the short-circuiting to the rest of the cells and caused the fire, she said.

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