Apple CEO Tim Cook is Gay? Attends Pride Festival After Accidental Outing

Speculations about the sexual identity of Apple's new chief, Tim Cook, was somewhat confirmed during a live segment of "Squawk On The Street" on CNBC last Friday, New York Daily News reported. Host Simon Hobbs, who is one of the co-anchors of the segment, had made a journalism faux pas when he inadvertently said that the silver-haired, bespectacled Apple CEO is allegedly gay.

Hobbs' comment sparked when New York Times columnist and CNBC contributor James B. Stewart, who was a guest on the show, discussed on his latest column, the struggles of former BP chief John Browne as a closeted gay CEO. Browne has been known as the first CEO of a Fortune 500 or FTSE 100 company to publicly acknowledge that he is gay after being outed by a tabloid. He later resigned from the oil and gas giant in 2007 following the revelation.

"I just found it very, very fascinating... Of course, there are gay CEOs in major companies. I reached out to many of them," Stewart quipped.

However, the CNBC co-anchor probably wasn't thinking clearly when Stewart answered a question about CEOs' reluctance to be publicly known as gay, although he did say the initial interaction with the people he knew who were gay was pleasant.

Hobbs remarked, "I think Tim Cook is open about the fact he's gay at the head of Apple. Isn't he?"

Hobbs' statement resulted to a complete silence between panelists for what seemed to be an eternity on air. Stewart had regained the shock of Hobbs' statement when he told the latter that Cook has yet to admit that he's gay.

Daily News said Hobbs quickly realized the error and tried to backtrack, but failed.

Buzzfeed reported that there had been no public admissions from Cook about his sexual orientation, but he has been a staunch supporter of LGBT rights as a human issue. Out Magazine named him as the most powerful LGBT person on its 2013 power list.

Despite the on-air snafu that had gained social media traction, it did not stop Cook to do what he loves best, which is to support human rights issues. Cook today tweeted a photo showing 5,000 Apple employees and their families taking part at the Pride parade. Several others also shared on Twitter, Cook's latest gesture, which was the distribution of iTunes cards that allows the cardbearer one free song download. Reuters have said that the CEO had greeted the participating Apple community early in the morning, but did not march in the parade himself. Nonetheless, Cook did not shy away from selfie requests from Apple employees and family members at the event, and majority of the photos show him smiling towards the camera.