Though he got what he wanted in regard to the shareholder proposal, this is not the end of Einhorn’s spat with Apple, whom he recently compared to a Depression Era grandmother because of how conservative the company is about keeping cash around.

Einhorn owns about 1 million shares of Apple stock. He sued the company because he disagreed with a proposal that would have required Apple to get shareholder approval before issuing any kind of preferred stock. He won an injunction from a federal judge who said Apple had wrongly “bundled” the proposal regarding preferred stock with other tweaks to the company’s charter in one proposal. As a result, Apple was forced to take the proposal off the shareholder ballot, which was voted on this past Tuesday at the company’s annual meeting in California.

Einhorn has meanwhile taken his plan for Apple to offer a preferred stock he’s dubbed “iPrefs” — that would pay a 50 cent quarterly dividend forever — public. Apple CEO Tim Cook has promised to review the proposal, but hasn’t yet offered a public answer to Einhorn.

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The proposal included three amendments to the company’s charter, concerning language describing directors’ terms of office, eliminating Apple’s ability to issue “blank check” preferred stock, and setting par value company stock. The judge granted Greenlight Capital CEO David Einhorn’s request on a technicality: the proposal “impermissibly bundles ‘separate matters’ for shareholder consideration.” But the preferred stock issue is the one Einhorn is after.

Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

As a quick refresher of how we got here: Einhorn, whose firm owns more than a million shares of Apple stock, two weeks ago went public with a conversation he’d been having with Apple’s executives since last year. He had pressed them on a scheme for offering preferred stock as a way of boosting investor confidence in Apple and as a way to keep its cash from piling up even more rapidly. When Apple proposed eliminating its ability to issue preferred stock, he sued the company.

The ruling comes a day after Einhorn garnered a bunch of publicity for what he’s really after: that Apple issue a new class of preferred stock he’s dubbed “iPrefs” that would pay a 50 cent quarterly dividend forever. Apple has yet to publicly respond to the specifics of the proposal other than a promise to consider it.

The company’s annual shareholder meeting is scheduled for Feb. 27.

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Einhorn is framing the proposal as a way for Apple to avoid having to find other ways of distributing its $137 billion in cash it already has. He said his plan would mean Apple would spend about $1.9 billion per year issuing iPrefs. At the same time, he is trying to defeat a proposal Apple has put before shareholders, that would, among other things, allow Apple to issue “blank check” preferred stock. Last week, Apple CEO Tim Cook called the preferred stock idea “creative” but dismissed Einhorn’s lawsuit to get Proposal No. 2 removed “a silly sideshow.” Apple has promised to consider his ideas.

Here are some observations from Apple followers and finance experts about Einhorn’s strategy:

• The Guardian notes that Einhorn’s plan is meant to reward investors and coax them into boosting the stock: “Einhorn is taking a mathematical route. He believes shareholders will reward Apple for giving them cash by pushing up the price of the stock. ‘Apple wants to keep its cake, and its shareholders can eat it too,’ he said.”
• Fortune said he didn’t make a good case for the plan’s ability to boost the stock value: “Einhorn himself acknowledged that Apple’s common stock would go down when the iPrefs are issued and that a $50 iPref was also likely to lose value as soon as hit the market — undermining all his subsequent calculations for how much of Apple’s intrinsic value his scheme would unlock.”
• Bloomberg quotes investors who aren’t super thrilled with the dual strategy of the iPrefs plan and lobbying against Apple’s shareholder proposal No. 2.: Rich Clayton of CtW Investment Group calls Einhorn’s campaign against Apple “in no way necessary” and says Apple’s proposal “is being hijacked.”
• Bespoke Investor Group, via WSJ, says Apple’s cash hoard isn’t that big of a deal anyway: ”While you might think this is high, back in the early 2000s, Apple’s cash as a percentage of market cap was above 50% for years. And during the financial crisis, Apple’s cash got as high as 37%. Just something to be aware of as you hear all these calls for Apple to do something with its loot.”

As of the close of business Thursday, Apple’s cash was roughly 33 percent of its total market capitalization.

Einhorn said Thursday he would be meeting with Cook and other Apple representatives soon. The shareholders get to vote on the plan on Feb. 27.

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