Rumour knocks of $4 billion of Apple

Panic Investors sold Apple shares in a frenzy at $103.42 per share, today, after reading a blog report on delays to the company's future products. The rumor, posted to the popular blog Engadget briefly knocked $4bn off Apple's market value. Engadget, taken in by a spoof Apple internal email, reported the company's two most important new launches would be delayed, the iPhone until October, and the new operating system Mac OS X Leopard till January.

Well, it turned out that the email was indeed a hoax. In a later post, Engadget claims that the email was in fact sent from Apple’s internal email system but that it was inaccurate. Apple immediately notified Engadget of the error by saying that the communication was fake and did not come from Apple. Apple, apparently is on track to ship iPhone in late June and Mac OS X Leopard in October.

Here's something to ponder on though. Someone, who bought on the panic, made a serious profit. It could be that Engadget was just the victim of a prank.Or prolly it was a pawn in some investors' scheme of fooling the market.