Part of Apple's plan to burn up a bit of that US$117.2 billion cache of cash starts today, according to Fortune's Philip Elmer-DeWitt. Over the next three years, Apple will use US$10 billion to repurchase shares of AAPL.
Elmer-DeWitt notes that one Wall Street analyst, Bernstein's Toni Sacconaghi, was less than thrilled by the announcement of the stock buyback when it was announced back in March. Sacconaghi wanted the company to give back some of the cash horde to shareholders, in particular the institutional investors who hold 70 percent of the total ownership of Apple. The repurchase plan really doesn't accomplish that,
