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El portátil no está aquí. Alguien lo ha robado.

El portátil no está aquí. Alguien lo ha robado.
The laptop is not here. Someone has stolen it.
From Lesson 119:Pronouns with the present perfect (lo he visto)·Spanish (Spain)

Questions & Answers about El portátil no está aquí. Alguien lo ha robado.

Why is lo placed before ha robado instead of after it?
In the Pretérito Perfecto, object pronouns like lo must always go immediately before the conjugated form of the verb haber (here, ha). You can never put the pronoun between ha and robado, and you cannot attach it to the end of the participle robado.
What exactly does the lo refer to in this sentence?
The pronoun lo means 'it' and refers back to el portátil (the laptop). Because portátil is a masculine singular noun, we must use the masculine singular direct object pronoun lo.
Why do we use está instead of es for 'is not here'?
We use está (from the verb estar) because the sentence is talking about location (aquí, meaning 'here'). You should always use estar when stating where something or someone is physically located.
Is portátil always a noun meaning 'laptop'?
The word portátil is originally an adjective that means 'portable'. In Spain, it is short for el ordenador portátil (the portable computer), but in everyday speech, people almost always just use el portátil as a noun to mean 'the laptop'.

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