Shares of Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL), the world's most valuable company, soared more than $16, to a new high of $680.87 in early Monday trading, before closing at to $675.68, up $12.46,. Apple's prior record was $674.88, set last week.
Shares of Samsung Electronics (Seoul: 005930) plunged nearly 8 percent in Seoul following the company's $1.05 billion loss to Apple, the world's most valuable technology company, in a patent infringement case in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., on Friday.
The plunge trimmed Samsung's market capitalization by $12 billion. Shares fell as low as 1.17 million won (US $1,033) before closing at 1.18 million won. Apple's 2 percent gain brought its value to $633.4 billion.
"This is a huge victory for Apple," said Jefferies analyst Peter Misek. "Minimum damages are set at $1.05 billion. However, we believe the actual award will be larger."
Samsung has said it will file an appeal.
In South Korea, the electronics giant as well as one of Apple's principal suppliers, sent employees a memo stating, "History has yet shown there has yet to be a company that has won the hearts and minds of consumers and achieved continuous growth when its primary means to competition has been the outright abuse of patent law, not the pursuit of innovation."
Elsewhere in Asia, shares of some other smartphone makers fell, including China's ZTE (Shenzen:00063) which dropped more than 8 percent, while Taiwan's HTC (Taipei: 2498) fell about 2 percent. Not surprisingly, shares of Hon Hai Precision Industries (Taipei: 2317) rose about 1 percent. Hon Hai, under the name Foxconn, is Apple's top contract manufacturer.
Apple did not make products "for competitors to flagrantly copy," Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in a statement circulated to Apple employees.
Many analysts commented the legal win, while preliminary, should strengthen Apple's prospects, especially because it may be about to introduce new smartphones to upgrade the nearly year-old iPhone 4S as well as brand extensions for the iPad, whose third-generation product started sales this year.
At Bernstein Research, A.M. Sacconaghi set a new $750 one-year price target for Apple and noted the setback for Samsung may also injure Google (Nasdaq: GOOG), the No. 1 search engine company as well as owner of the Motorola smartphone brand, as well as the Android OS. The verdict could also be "marginally beneficial" to Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), the No. 1 software company, which plans to ship its Windows 8 for smartphones in October, he said. To date, only Finland's Nokia Oyj (NYSE: NOK) has said it will base all its phones on Windows 8.
Google shares fell $9.41 to $669.22, while those of Microsoft rose 12 cents to $30.69 at the Monday close.
