六级阅读模拟二.docx

六级阅读模拟选词填空Nice juicy Apple　　ALTHOUGH he is still (1)__________ things up at Dell, an ailing computer-maker, Carl Icahn has found time to tilt at another tech titan. On August 13th the veteran shareholder activist (2) __________that he had built up a stake in Apple, though he stayed mum about exactly how many shares he had bought. Mr Icahn’s intentions, however, are crystal clear: he wants the consumer-electronics behemoth to expand plans to return some of its whopping $147 billion of cash and marketable securities to shareholders.　　Mr Icahn is also after more money at Dell, where he has been lobbying with allies against a (3)__________ buy-out plan put forward by Michael Dell, the firm’s founder, and Silver Lake, a private-equity firm. His pressing has already forced the buy-out group to raise its initial offer by over $350m, to $24.8 billion and he has taken his (4)__________ to the courts in a bid to extract an even higher price.　　Other tech firms have been attracting the attention of activist investors too. Earlier this year ValueAct Capital, an investment fund, said it had built up a $2 billion stake in Microsoft. Jaguar Financial, a Canadian bank, has been (5)__________ fresh thinking at troubled BlackBerry, which announced on August 12th that it is exploring various (6) __________options, including alliances and a possible sale. And Elliott Management, a hedge fund, has been lobbying for change at NetApp, a data-storage firm that it thinks could do more to improve returns to (7)__________.　　One reason tech firms have found themselves in activists’ crosshairs is that, like Apple, some built up big cash piles during the economic downturn and have been slow to use the money. Financiers hope to get them to loosen their purse-strings faster and to pocket some of the cash. Mr Icahn wants Apple to increase and (8)__________ a share buy-back programme that is currently set to return $60 billion to shareholders by the end of 2015.　　Another reason that tech firms make t