Today is one of those days when the "after the bell" news would have been far different at 4:01 than (now) at around 6:30. I was watching Apple Computer charge up the mountain of a chart from yesterday's eight-month low, thinking how wonderful investors must feel. And then, bang right at the closing bell: bad news.

Immediately, AAPL began slipping, correcting almost three percentage points from its 5.27% gain. Although the stock ended the day at $58.97, a gain of $2.95, it's now down to $57.30 in after-hours trading.

Not only did Apple announce the discovery of old stock option grant irregularities, but also was still recovering from yesterday's announcement that the next iteration of the iPod might be delayed. The market's giddy reaction to the quarter-percentage-point interest rate increase wasn't enough to save AAPL from two negative stories in two days.

Apple after the bell 06-29-06: slipping, sliding, irregularity-hiding originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 29 Jun 2006 18:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.