Time To Trim Apple?

A handful of pundits and bloggers have mentioned this as a good time to trim positions in Apple. Until today though the stock didn't give any support to those arguments. However now the stock is up 43% on the year, trades at a P/E nearing 40 and is perhaps overdue for a pullback. In its first major move to the downside today the stock is off 2.5% in afternoon trading in spite of strength in the broader indexes. Look for Apple to pull back further particularly if the market struggles with weak data this week. With the iPhone release approaching there is enough downside risk to warrant traders trimming their positions. On the other hand Steve Jobs and Apple are on a roll and the near term momentum they are experiencing could very likely continue. Decisions like this are never easy, but anytime a stock is up 40%+ on the year I think taking some gains is intelligent.