Your finances: Own a piece of Apple pie?

By various accounts, Apple Inc. is now bigger than Spain, Portugal and Greece (combined), or the entire retail sector of the U.S. economy, or 13 Warren Buffetts. What are we to think about that?

First, a disclosure. In my two-person household are many Apple products, and 200 shares of Apple stock, purchased by my husband roughly two decades ago. He would have had 400 shares, but -- as he frequently reminds me -- I talked him into selling 100 shares (pre-split) back when it was selling for $65 a share, a price I thought was frighteningly high. It closed Friday at $605 a share.

So, 1) No sane person would take buy or sell advice from me; and 2) I have a vested interest in everyone plowing more and more into this company until it's worth more than every other company put together, or I can convince my husband to sell more. However, that isn't the point of this column.

Rather, it's to offer some perspective on this gorilla of Wall Street.

Less-expensive proxies. You may already be an Apple shareholder, according to data compiled by Lipper, a Thomson Reuters company. For example: Do you own PowerShares QQQ Trust, Series 1? That's an exchange-traded fund that is sold as an inexpensive proxy for the whole of Nasdaq. As of March 31, Apple made up 17.5 percent of that fund; so if you had $20,000 in that ETF, you were sitting on $3,500 of Apple stock.

Other popular funds that hold a lot of Apple are Fidelity Contrafund, with 9.46 percent of its March 31 portfolio in Apple; Vanguard Growth Index Fund, with 6.13 percent; and Fidelity Growth Company Fund, with 7.9 percent of the portfolio.

Not exactly an exclusive. Institutions dominate the stock, holding 69.1 percent of all Apple shares as of the end of March. Apple pessimists say the fact that everybody seems to own the stock is a good argument for selling it. Lest we forget, in 1999, Microsoft reached a $619-billion market capitalization, and it's now worth a shade less than $255 billion. The once-popular bull market Wall Street adage holds, "Trees don't grow to the sky."

But still-higher share price possible. Some people still think the company is reasonably priced. At least two analysts are predicting a $1,000 share price for the company.

Troubles ahead, some say. But naysayers have a point, too. They look at the death of Steve Jobs, the problematic labor conditions in China where most Apple equipment is made, the antitrust lawsuit filed against Apple and others by the Justice Department claiming collusion on e-book prices, increased competition from other smartphones, tablets and streaming video services, and say the company's easiest earnings days are behind it.

Key facts

If you own a mutual fund, you may already be an Apple shareholder. As of March 31, Apple made up 17.5 percent of PowerShares QQQ Trust, Series 1, an exchange-traded fund that is sold as an inexpensive proxy for the whole of Nasdaq; 9.46 percent of Fidelity Contrafund; 6.13 percent of Vanguard Growth Index Fund; and 7.9 percent of Fidelity Growth Company Fund.

Institutions dominate the stock, holding more than two-thirds of all Apple shares as of the end of March. Apple pessimists say the fact that everybody seems to own the stock is a good argument for selling it. The once-popular bull market Wall Street adage holds, "Trees don't grow to the sky."

At least two analysts are predicting a $1,000 share price for Apple. But naysayers look at Steve Jobs' death, the problematic China labor conditions in China where most Apple equipment is made, the antitrust lawsuit filed against Apple and others by the Justice Department claiming collusion on e-book prices, increased competition from other smartphones, tablets and streaming video services, and say the company's easiest earnings days are behind it.