Apple Inc. (AAPL): Tim Cook Too Sexy for Congress?

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), at one time, was considered a “sexy” company. It was once considered cool to be affiliated with Apple by owning one of its products. It was a status symbol and it showed a person had good taste and appreciated quality. That was when Apple was considered a true innovator.

Congress, on the other hand, has never been called sexy or thought of that way. Even with some of the most revered statesmen in our founding days who served in Congress, most of them wore white powdered wigs. While fashionable, they could certainly not be called sexy.

So you have an interesting dichotomy when Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) CEO Tim Cook sat before a congressional committee last week and testified about the U.S. tax code and explained in as simple terms as possible (so the congressmen could understand) why Apple chose to present a bond offering to get some stockholder cash rather than re-patriating its overseas profit and pay exorbitant taxes.

That might have been a “uh-duh” moment of the decade, if not the century, for Congress.  So does this make Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) sexy once again as a company? Considering some of the derision Apple is getting from some corners of the not-sexy Congress, that answer just might be yes. But what does that say about CEO Tim Cook? Does that make him sexy?

If you question that, don’t. Apparently that distinction has already been established – officially. It was reported Friday that Cook has won the prestigious award of Sexiest Congressional Testifier alive for 2013. We don’t know what the criteria were, but we do know that Congress apparently makes the decision. At least for now, it could mean that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has gotten its sexy back.

The award is a bit of an upset, as Cook topped five-time defending champion Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM), who apparently had lost some sexiness earlier this year when his company suffered major losses and he had some less-than-friendly exchanges with government regulators in recent months.

What did Cook have to say about such a reputation-building accolade?

Upon learning of the award, Cook tried to be humble. “I always knew I was sexy, but until this week I never thought of myself as a favorite of Congress,” he said. “I don’t think my friends can quite believe it. But Congress has spoken and I respect that legislative body’s judgment on the matter.” He went on to say that he hopes he can leverage the gravitas of the award into a business-friendly policy that eases the tax burdens on re-patriated money so companies can be allowed to invest in the U.S. without having to pay huge penalties. “Call me a dreamer, but I think I can make it happen,” Cook said.

Give us your thoughts about Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and its sexiness factor in the comments section below.

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