Apple as a safe harbor stock

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) tumbled after its last earnings report with concerns that its iPhone product would not be out until June. Then its set-top box was delayed until mid-March.

But the news for Apple seems to be getting better now that spring is here. NPD Research released a study showing Mac sales up over 100% in January. Given Dell's (NASDAQ:DELL) tepid sales, Apple seems to be moving against the industry trend.

Wall Street has been impressed. Prudential upgraded the shares to "overweight." The brokerage caught on to the Mac sales increase and is hopeful about the iPhone launch.

After dropping from over $97 in mid-January, the company's lackluster guidance took the stock as low as $83.21.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the market sell-off. Over the last month, the NASDAQ is down 4% while Apple is up over 2%. Contrast that to other tech heavyweights like IBM (NYSE:IBM), Cisco (NASD:CSCO), and Microsoft (NASD:MSFT) which are all down more than the tech index.

Apple has become, at least for the time being, a safe haven stock. An improbably role for a tech growth company, but a good place to invest recently nonetheless.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.