Refusing to pay dividends, he says, leads to cash hoarding and chronic over-capitalization, leading mangers to seek out investment choices with lower and lower net present values, which is especially true given that any return looks good relative to the effective 0% returns now available on cash.

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With the strong support of his board and an another supposedly positive earnings call coming later today, it's hard to call Steve's position as "shaky" at the company, but with whispers of infighting, a symbolic battle with Apple over market capitalization, and a do-or-die mobile launch coming up, it's clear that he's under a lot of pressure to deliver.

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Bonuses, until recently, were tied to market capitalization and stock movement over six-month intervals.

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And it wasn't the eye-popping sales figures for Apple's iPods or its new iPhone that sent Apple market capitalization--already up 25% over the past quarter--vaulting past IBM .

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That plunge is attributed to the country's still-shaky economy, which saw a 64.1% decrease in market capitalization over 2008.

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