After weeks of consternation about Steve Jobs’ health and the resulting hiatus from his daily duties as CEO of Apple, the company’s stock has recovered nearly all the losses it incurred since this unhappy episode started.

AAPL closed at $94.20 yesterday, up 3.82 percent for the day and close to where it stood on Jan. 5 – the day Steve Jobs reassured worried customers and investors that his gaunt appearance had resulted from an easily treatable hormone imbalance. AAPL rose 4.2 percent that day to close at $94.58.

Out of curiosity I averaged Apple’s closing stock prices for each day since Oct. 1 through yesterday. The result: $93.65. Despite the turmoil of Wall Street’s meltdown, a brutal retail environment, a disappointing Macworld Expo and even false rumors of a Steve Jobs heart attack, AAPL has remained surprisingly steady.

AAPL lost about 30 percent of its value to the initial wave of panic-related selling in September but has mostly bobbed up and down since.

During the four months since October, AAPL was as high as $111.04 (Oct. 30) and as low as $78.20 (Jan. 20, at the ugliest point in the most recent Jobs health tumult), but it was as low as $80.49 as far back as Nov. 20.

That the stock has climbed back to its average price of the past four months tells me that Wall Street now either believes 1) Steve will recover and lead Apple as before; or 2) Apple has a solid and accomplished senior management team capable of perpetuating the company’s success even without its charismatic leader.

I took the latter position at the time Steve announced his hiatus; Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook’s masterful performance during the company’s earnings conference call last week further validated it.

Is it possible that Wall Street suddenly is behaving rationally? Is it possible investors suddenly realize Apple’s success derives from more than just one man?

What about the dizzy speculation over whether Apple would falter without its founder, whether it had mislead shareholders by not disclosing more details about Jobs’ condition sooner, whether shareholders would sue and – last but not least --rumblings of an absurd SEC investigation into the whole mess?

Never mind.