Usually, at the bottom of my posts I disclose that I own Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) stock. Over the past couple years, it's been a nice fundamental stock with easy to read technical indicators that have allowed me to add to my retirement account.

But if you're using technicals to get in and out of a stock, you have to pay close attention to what is going on, and my attention was elsewhere during a recent project deadline. Behind my back, the stock dropped from the $170s to the $130s in the space of my busy single month.

My loss could well be your gain. Apple has leapt to a 10.6% market share in notebooks, and Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster expects Apple to show significant year-over-year sales gains with almost 3 million Macs and 11 million iPods. Recent customer surveys of people planning to buy a new computer have 34% interested in a Mac. But the recent general market, as well as fears about Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG)'s Android phone challenging the iPhone, have depressed the price. I've added to my portfolio at this price, as a result.

But don't take my word for it. Finance guru Jim Cramer also agrees that this recent drop in price makes Apple an attractive bargain:

Wall Street has wondered for some time how profitable the Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone is. First, numbers of analysts pulled the device apart and found out what each component cost. That probably gave a good sense of how much the margin was on the hardware.

But, there has always been a sense the Apple was making a great deal from AT&T (NYSE: T). This was based on the idea the the phone company gave Apple a bit of its service plan revenue in exchange for have an exclusive right to sell the phone in the U.S.

Now that Apple is coming close to closing deals to sell the phone in Europe, information is leaking out about what the consumer electronics company will make for calls placed on the device. According to The New York Post, T-Mobile will have exclusive rights to sell the phone in Germany but will pay "10 percent of the revenue from voice calls and data usage." If the German company is anything like Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ), it operations have an operating margin of 15%. So, they are giving up a very great deal indeed.

The paper also writes that Gene Munster, an analyst with Piper Jaffray, in July estimated that Apple collects $3 per month per iPhone subscriber from AT&T for voice calls and data usage, as well as $8 per month for every new subscriber who signs up for AT&T with the device. But, if the T-Mobile deal is as good as its looks for Apple, the estimate of what AT&T gives up may be too low.

The bottom line: If the iPhone is not a huge hit at bringing in net new customers to these cell carriers, then they have made very bad deals.

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

Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) in its last earnings report declared that 2007 was going to be an exciting year for the company. It may be exciting in all the wrong ways, however, as legal battles are already shaping up over its next major product and with a continuing investigation into stock options irregularities. It will be both a great year for products, and an interesting year to watch how this company makes it through some upcoming challenges. How Apple starts the year with announcements about its earnings over the holidays could have an important impact on the stock.

In Apple's last meeting in October, Peter Oppenheimer said to expect $6 to $6.2 billion of revenue and $0.70 to $0.73 earnings per share.

Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) calls for better-than-expected results, somewhere in the vicinity of $0.79 per share and $6.38 billion. Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster also expects earnings to come out a few pennies higher, and Munster often seems to read Apple retail better than other analysts.

With analysts betting on above-expected earnings, and such signs as iPods flying off the shelves and high traffic to Apple retail and websites, the money looks to be on Apple to beat earnings. But what's your vote?

Also check out some other earnings reports that we're following, and let us know your thoughts on earnings expectations.