Leave it to Steve Jobs to make $25 billion sound like rainy day money.

On Thursday, Apple's visionary CEO pooh-poohed the suggestions of those who think the company should buy back shares or pay a dividend, saying he prefers to hold on to that cash for acquisitions and investments.

But given Apple's history of deal making under Jobs, he might as well have said, "Our shares are up 135 percent since the beginning of last year alone, so shut up about the cash."

Which would be fine by me, really.

Instead he said, "We know if we need to acquire something -- a piece of the puzzle to make something big and bold -- we can write a check for it and not borrow a lot of money and put our whole company at risk," Jobs said at Apple's shareholder meeting, Bloomberg reported. "The cash in the bank gives us tremendous security and flexibility."

It's true. Apple likely won't ever need to ask someone to syndicate a deal for it. Let's put it this way. The biggest deal it's done since Jobs retook the company's helm was $275 million.

But Apple has stepped up its pace of acquisitions. Three of the 11 deals done under Jobs' leadership have come in the past five months, including that $275 million purchase of Quattro Wireless. And the company does now have its first dedicated dealmaker.

Jobs is definitely hinting that something bigger could be on the way.

"We're a large enough business now, that in order to really move the needle, we've got to be thinking pretty bold, pretty large," he said.

It's still unclear what Jobs might think is large. Apple had $43 billion in sales last year, so what would move that needle significantly? Ten percent, or $4 billion in sales?

Apple has never shown anything even resembling that kind of boldness when it comes to acquisitions.

But leave it to Jobs to surprise us all.