SEC filings: Apple number of shares

Question

I'm experiencing some trouble in understanding the evolution of the Apple number of shares.

In particular, I am looking at its 10-Qs of 27 June 2020 and 26 December 2020. Here, I read that there were 4,275,634,000 shares in July 2020 and 16,788,096,000 in January 2021, which I understand it means that Apple has almost quadrupled its number of shares over six months.

By googling "Apple number of shares" I didn't find any evidence of the number of shares being 4B in July 2020. Indeed, it seems that they were around 17B.

Could someone please help me understanding what I am reading in the SEC filings? Why in the June 2020 report 4B shares were reported?

Answer 1

They recently did a stock split a 4 for 1 split in August 2020:

https://investor.apple.com/faq/default.aspx

How many times has Apple’s stock split?

Apple’s stock has split five times since the company went public. The stock split on a 4-for-1 basis on August 28, 2020, a 7-for-1 basis on June 9, 2014, and split on a 2-for-1 basis on February 28, 2005, June 21, 2000, and June 16, 1987.

That 4-for-1 split quadrupled the number and shares, and cut the price per share in a quarter. Resulting in the same value for the investors.