Tech giant (NASDAQ: AAPL) has seen a nice run-up this year. Shares have risen more than 15% year to date as of this writing. Bidding up the stock in 2024, investors seem convinced the company could benefit from its innovations in artificial intelligence (AI).

While the iPhone maker might see a solid upgrade cycle for its new iPhones this year thanks to AI, this doesn't automatically make the stock a buy. Valuation matters, too -- and the stock's Valuation is looking quite pricey. Of course, that doesn't necessarily make the stock a sell, either. Indeed, if I had to categorize the stock as either a buy, sell, or hold, I'd probably call it a hold.

There's no denying that Apple sets a high standard in business. On its approximately $386 billion in trailing-12-month revenue, for instance, the company generated an astounding $104 billion in free cash flow. This, combined with the company's war chest of cash ($153 billion at the end of its most recent quarter), enabled it to buy back an incredible $96 billion worth of its own stock over this same period. And this is on top of the $15.1 billion it spent on dividends. Extraordinary!

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Source Fool.com