Time for Apple to fulfill social responsibility

Thanks to consumers' high hopes that Apple will launch yet another revolutionary product on the 10th anniversary of iPhone, the company's market value has again shot up, to about $700 billion this week, underlining the optimism in the stock market of the United States and the widespread appreciation of the game-changing gadgets created by the world's most valuable company.

With the Dow Jones Industrial Average recently crossing the historic 20,000 point level, it is no surprise that some giant companies like Apple have seen their shares touch new highs. Irrespective of how suspicious the drivers behind the ongoing surge of US shares are, given the increasing uncertainty over global economic growth, the rising tide has helped, if not all, the most valuable boats to sail to safer waters.

Things were quite different just a year ago. Few people applauded Apple for making the largest quarterly earnings by any company at the end of 2015. Some even voiced concerns over iPhone's "dubious" future in China as the competition in the smartphone market intensified in the world's second-largest economy. But that Apple's shares have hit an all-time closing high now indicates that investors, at least for now, should not worry about consumers not loving iPhones as much as they used to do.