Tim Cook needs to hire a C-level media relations officer immediately. Its painfully obvious that Cook has no idea how to handle the media and Wall Street.
Cook allows total bullshit rumors to fester for WEEKS on end. Just hire someone who knows Wall Street and knows how to defend the stock. Its pathetic.
Apple grew revenue by $50 billion this past year. Revenue was up 30% Profits up 40% EPS up 55% Yet the stock is worth LESS than it was a year ago.
The problem is Cook is not controlling the narrative. Even though Apple is dominating the entire tech world in reality the narrative is the exact opposite. According to the Wall Street narrative Apple is a dying brand and will be demoted to Dell/HP status in a few years.
Goldman Sachs a few weeks ago came out with a note that said Apple will transition to a services company and thus should get a higher PE than a hardware company. The stock went up 4% that day. Why could not Cook say the same thing WEEKS AGO! Its like the guy has no clue what Wall Street wants. We need a CEO with VISION. I'm doubting that Cook has that.
If the supply chain rumors really were true and indicative of a gigantic earnings miss (which is how the stock is reacting) then Apple most likely would have warned already.
If the supply chain rumors are either bogus or true but not indicative of an earnings miss, then this punishment is (1) unjustified, and (2) temporary up until earnings are announced and the drastically lowered expectations are trounced. How often does THAT happen with Apple. Typically even good earnings are frowned upon due to hyped expectations. I and many others here do believe that Apple's earnings will be in the upper range of their guidance, so if expectations (and the current share price) keep diving, then I think we will see it all come back and then some in January at the earnings call.
If that is the case, i.e. that the punishment is only temporary, then this is an opportunity for Apple to buy its own stock while its low. And in that case, the last thing you want to do is make announcements to "defend the stock". Let the earnings defend it for you after you buy back all you can.
sog has finally outed himself as another glass-half-empty naysayer who thinks Timmy Cook is a failure.
What other description can we give Cook?
Apple added over $50 billion in revenue and $10 billion in profit last year. Yet the stock is worth LESS than last year.
That's all on Cook. He's allowing Wall Street to control the narrative. Which is unforgiveable. All Cook would have to do is open his mouth and refute all these LIES that media spews. How hard is that?
Its a fuking embarassement that sans cash Google is worth more than Apple. Even though Apple is generating 4x the profits.
You're just being nonsensical now. The minute Apple responds to one rumor they have to respond to them all otherwise people will assume the ones they don't respond to are true. I think Tim Cook has better things to do with his time than call up CNBC to tell them some Digitimes rumor is false.
Personally what I would like to see Cook do is bring on an SVP to oversee all of Apple's cloud business, Apple Maps and Siri. Make a big push in to cloud in a serious way. Eddy Cue has way too much on his plate and it's showing with products and services that could be much better than they are. Let Eddy focus all his time on Apple Music, Apple TV, iTunes and App Store. Let him focus on turning Apple Music and Apple TV into the recurring revenue streams aka "annuities" Wall Street is looking for. Bring someone new in who has a lot of experience in cloud computing and machine learning. Show Wall Street that Apple is seriously upping it's game in services and get them off of living and dying by iPhone sales figures.
How freakin hard would it be for Cook or any Apple representative to say these supply checks are not realiable?
I mean if someone is saying lies about my family, I sure as hell going to shut those lies down. Why can't Apple? Why do they allow these supply chain rumors to fester for WEEKS?
Maybe because Apple is buying back tons of undervalued stock while it is TEMPORARILY punished. In this case I claim temporary because if the views for the December quarter or the subsequent March quarter are too bleak, then Apple will be in the rare situation where the analysts are expecting lower results and/or lower March guidance than they will receive. Stock should recover if those premises hold. So it's good to be staying mum and buying back the cheap shares.
Anyway I agree that the company, and especially Tim Cook needs to do a better job driving the narrative. At some point you have to hold the company responsible for the sentiment about it.
At the time being which do you think is better for Apple: Lower stock price or higher stock price?
If you were making the decisions at Appls would you encourage a strategy or narrative that would take the pps up?
And why would you do that?
Tim has repeatedly said" Apple is run for the longrun "
Low stock price helps Apples buyback...lots more shares off the float.
And when buyback is done and Apple PR chooses to fight the narrative and restore confidance... The shareholders will Realize the benifit . IMHO
Any CEO whose company "added over $50 billion in revenue and $10 billion in profit last year" is not a "failure," basically by definition. Who, in the business world, is less of a failure? If you are losing money in the stock market, I can see why that might make you feel like a failure and want to blame it on someone else.
Apple isn't concerned about short-term share price movement. They have said this a number of times, and it makes sense. They are also not primarily in business to benefit the people who are trying to make a quick buck by buying and selling shares over short periods. Apple is interested in making lots of money by making the best products possible, and I think most people here would agree that they have been doing well with that aim. Reliable and growing profits should be the fundamental drivers for the stock price, but there are lots of other factors that affect people's predictions for the future and perceptions of value, some of which are rational, some of which are not. Apple could try to get more into the psychological aspect of things, and make more of an effort to convince people that the shares are undervalued (which of course seems obvious to many of us), but they are actually very good about providing detailed numbers every three months, and those numbers are very impressive. Without precedent, really. It's so good that people just don't seem to know what to make of it.
As a long-time shareholder, it has been frustrating sometimes to see how undervalued the shares are by any comparative measure that I can find, but at the same time, I'm sure I wouldn't have held on to my shares for so long (or bought so many) if they hadn't always seemed like a great value. This has been great for me, because I got my first shares before the iPod came out, and just kept adding to the pile over the years.
Google is worth $445 billion (80 billion in cash) Apple is worth $411 billion (200 billion in cash)
fuking pathetic.
Apple makes 4x the profits of Google yet its worth less.
This is on all Tim Cook. He refuses to defend the stock and allows Wall Street to state pure bullshiit as fact.
how many times did Jobs go after wall street? he made a few cracks, but i am not remembering any apple front page news about it, or editorials in the paper about it. unlike you, they are more concerned about making great products than whether or not their stock meets your performance level. the stock market is about popularity more than anything these days anyways.
Google is worth $445 billion (80 billion in cash) Apple is worth $411 billion (200 billion in cash)
fuking pathetic.
Apple makes 4x the profits of Google yet its worth less.
This is on all Tim Cook. He refuses to defend the stock and allows Wall Street to state pure bullshiit as fact.
how many times did Jobs go after wall street? he made a few cracks, but i am not remembering any apple front page news about it, or editorials in the paper about it. unlike you, they are more concerned about making great products than whether or not their stock meets your performance level. the stock market is about popularity more than anything these days anyways.
Google is worth $445 billion (80 billion in cash) Apple is worth $411 billion (200 billion in cash)
fuking pathetic.
Apple makes 4x the profits of Google yet its worth less.
This is on all Tim Cook. He refuses to defend the stock and allows Wall Street to state pure bullshiit as fact.
how many times did Jobs go after wall street? he made a few cracks, but i am not remembering any apple front page news about it, or editorials in the paper about it. unlike you, they are more concerned about making great products than whether or not their stock meets your performance level. the stock market is about popularity more than anything these days anyways.
Its not about front page news / cracks / editorials. It is about Cook not performing one of his primary duties as the CEO of a publicly traded corporation. He has a set of fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders. Many of the flame throwers on these boards fail to recognize that there would not be an Apple had shareholders not ponied up years ago. Cook should be unlocking shareholder value and getting it back into our pockets. That is not incompatible with making great products, being environmentally sensitive, socially responsible, etc.
Google is worth $445 billion (80 billion in cash) Apple is worth $411 billion (200 billion in cash)
fuking pathetic.
Apple makes 4x the profits of Google yet its worth less.
This is on all Tim Cook. He refuses to defend the stock and allows Wall Street to state pure bullshiit as fact.
how many times did Jobs go after wall street? he made a few cracks, but i am not remembering any apple front page news about it, or editorials in the paper about it. unlike you, they are more concerned about making great products than whether or not their stock meets your performance level. the stock market is about popularity more than anything these days anyways.
Its not about front page news / cracks / editorials. It is about Cook not performing one of his primary duties as the CEO of a publicly traded corporation. He has a set of fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders. Many of the flame throwers on these boards fail to recognize that there would not be an Apple had shareholders not ponied up years ago. Cook should be unlocking shareholder value and getting it back into our pockets. That is not incompatible with making great products, being environmentally sensitive, socially responsible, etc.
Its not about front page news / cracks / editorials. It is about Cook not performing one of his primary duties as the CEO of a publicly traded corporation. He has a set of fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders. Many of the flame throwers on these boards fail to recognize that there would not be an Apple had shareholders not ponied up years ago. Cook should be unlocking shareholder value and getting it back into our pockets. That is not incompatible with making great products, being environmentally sensitive, socially responsible, etc.
just out of curiosity- which of his duties (that you seem to know well enough) is he shirking, let alone all? ceos typically receive the desires of the board and deemed ok by successes and failures (money or no money). one of the duties is being good to the shareholders (profitability)- if they disagreed with what he is doing- they would oust him, no? you may be a shareholder, but you are apparently in the minority when it comes to the approval rating of Mr. Cook. By your standards Amazon's ceo is a bad ceo even though the board keeps him on, no? if you are not on the board, i am not sure how you claim to know so much. and as i said- there is little he can do as wall street is more about popularity than actual math, hence apple make a boat load of money but always being lauded as the the tech company that keeps missing it. and you missed the point of what i was writing about in the first place in a reply about- why does Tim Cook need to say anything about the company to make wall street understand the company success story. you may not think he is doing his job as a ceo, but that is not relevant to my reply. make a new post.
I am investor. I see no need why the stock must endure so much volatility. Cook could simply issue a non-emotional legal press release in times like this to calm the markets. Similar to the Cramer email response. It's the secrecy and the silence that scares Wall Street. Neither secrecy nor silence needs to continue. It scares the retail investor to see share price go on these roller coaster rides, when the company is sound and healthy. There is no need for roller coaster experiences. Cook or Maestri could calm the fears easily. Or, better yet, hire a Wall Street veteran that knows the fears of Wall Street, and out that person in charge of media investor relations. A company this large should not have this kind of volatility in its share price.
You could make the case that Cook is loving this low price, in order to buy back more shares. Seems like an odd way to run a company. Unless the goal is to actually take it back private in several years.
Too much float. The split was a mistake. Too many shares on the market for MMs to manipulate. Buybacks will help but not for several years. Oil prices not helping. But greatest offense is Cooks silence and secrecy. Market does not like secrecy. Apple is being penalized now for it. Cook could solve it in five minutes, just like he did with Cramer during China mess. But I doubt he will. A company this size should not sell off 10% in one week.
Too much float. The split was a mistake. Too many shares on the market for MMs to manipulate. Buybacks will help but not for several years. Oil prices not helping. But greatest offense is Cooks silence and secrecy. Market does not like secrecy. Apple is being penalized now for it. Cook could solve it in five minutes, just like he did with Cramer during China mess. But I doubt he will. A company this size should not sell off 10% in one week.
You just joined this morning and you already post like Sog.
He takes the time to trump up gay rights, minority rights, and coding for 10 year olds.
Yet he does not have 5 minutes to go on an interview on CNBC and say holiday sales are going great and confirming guidance? If he just did that the stock would be solidly at $120 right now.
I so sick of this pathetic CEO. So many reasons why he sucks. But it gets masked because of the power of the Apple brand. Let me name you the ways:
1. Not bringing an bigger iPhone in 2013. No excuse for not bringing out the 4.7 inch iPhone along with the 5s. This allowed Samsung to make massive inroads. It took almost 2 years to reverse that bad move.
2. Waiting too long to get into streaming music. If they were ahead of the curve they would have been dominating streaming music.
3. Pathetic iPad lineup. Intentionally hamstringing the iPad Mini. Then refusing to release an updated Air in 2015. WTF is that about. iPad sales shrinking 20%. Not pushing for iPad specific Apps. He totally botched the iPad the last 2 years. Things such as the Pencil and type cover should have been out TWO YEARS AGO. Yet his arrogance refused him to believe that the Surface had something right.
4. Watch software failure. The software is too hard to use. Too much emphasis on the $20k watches. Apps are way too slow. Prices are way too expensive.
5. Refusal to sacrifice some short-term profits for long-term success. Keeping the 16GB iPhone. Being stingy on RAM. Releasing half baked iOS updates with a ton of bugs.
6. Crappy jobs controlling the narrative. Wall street spews bullshit and Cook does nothing. Some flyby night media in China is seen as more crediable than Cook. Pathetic.
But this should not be a surprise. Cook is a bean counter not a visionary. He has not VISION. All he cares about is trying to meet the profit goals for the next quarter. He spends $120 billion on a buyback to appease Wall Street yet does not have 5 minutes to shut down bullshit Wall Street rumors.
I really wanted to disagree with you, but you made some good points. Thing is, I'd be very worried about the company in anybody else's hands. It's a tough job.
Comments
If the supply chain rumors really were true and indicative of a gigantic earnings miss (which is how the stock is reacting) then Apple most likely would have warned already.
If the supply chain rumors are either bogus or true but not indicative of an earnings miss, then this punishment is (1) unjustified, and (2) temporary up until earnings are announced and the drastically lowered expectations are trounced. How often does THAT happen with Apple. Typically even good earnings are frowned upon due to hyped expectations. I and many others here do believe that Apple's earnings will be in the upper range of their guidance, so if expectations (and the current share price) keep diving, then I think we will see it all come back and then some in January at the earnings call.
If that is the case, i.e. that the punishment is only temporary, then this is an opportunity for Apple to buy its own stock while its low. And in that case, the last thing you want to do is make announcements to "defend the stock". Let the earnings defend it for you after you buy back all you can.
Personally what I would like to see Cook do is bring on an SVP to oversee all of Apple's cloud business, Apple Maps and Siri. Make a big push in to cloud in a serious way. Eddy Cue has way too much on his plate and it's showing with products and services that could be much better than they are. Let Eddy focus all his time on Apple Music, Apple TV, iTunes and App Store. Let him focus on turning Apple Music and Apple TV into the recurring revenue streams aka "annuities" Wall Street is looking for. Bring someone new in who has a lot of experience in cloud computing and machine learning. Show Wall Street that Apple is seriously upping it's game in services and get them off of living and dying by iPhone sales figures.
You forgot 7) Not taking Apple private.
There will be a time when iPhone sales in one quarter fail to surpass sales in the same quarter in the previous year.
No company can grow sales forever. I know this... and I'm sure the fine folks at Apple know this too.
The good thing is... Apple will still be selling around 200 million iPhones a year... and making a ton of profit from each one.
Meanwhile... other companies can barely sell 20 million phones a year... and they LOSE money.
So why are people worried about Apple?
Apple isn't concerned about short-term share price movement. They have said this a number of times, and it makes sense. They are also not primarily in business to benefit the people who are trying to make a quick buck by buying and selling shares over short periods. Apple is interested in making lots of money by making the best products possible, and I think most people here would agree that they have been doing well with that aim. Reliable and growing profits should be the fundamental drivers for the stock price, but there are lots of other factors that affect people's predictions for the future and perceptions of value, some of which are rational, some of which are not. Apple could try to get more into the psychological aspect of things, and make more of an effort to convince people that the shares are undervalued (which of course seems obvious to many of us), but they are actually very good about providing detailed numbers every three months, and those numbers are very impressive. Without precedent, really. It's so good that people just don't seem to know what to make of it.
As a long-time shareholder, it has been frustrating sometimes to see how undervalued the shares are by any comparative measure that I can find, but at the same time, I'm sure I wouldn't have held on to my shares for so long (or bought so many) if they hadn't always seemed like a great value. This has been great for me, because I got my first shares before the iPod came out, and just kept adding to the pile over the years.
and you missed the point of what i was writing about in the first place in a reply about- why does Tim Cook need to say anything about the company to make wall street understand the company success story. you may not think he is doing his job as a ceo, but that is not relevant to my reply. make a new post.