Brean Capital believes iPhone sales will fall to 216M this year, return to growth in 2017

AppleInsider

Though the firm remains bullish on Apple, Brean Capital believes Apple will see total iPhone sales for 2016 drop by 16 million units, amidst a slowing smartphone market.

Analyst Ananda Baruah issued a note to investors on Monday, a copy of which was provided to AppleInsider, reiterating Brean's "buy" rating on AAPL, but cutting its price target from $170 to $155.

In all, Baruah believes Apple will sell 216 million iPhones in calendar year 2016, a decline from the 232 million the company shipped in 2015. The estimates see iPhone sales remaining relatively consistent for the next few quarters, hitting 50 million in the just-concluded March frame, dipping to 40 million units in the June quarter, and growing to 50 million units in the September quarter.

For the holiday quarter, Brean Capital's forecast calls on Apple and its next-generation "iPhone 7" to drive sales up to 70 million. If the prediction holds accurate, that would be a decrease from both the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6 launches, which reached nearly 75 million units.

For iPhone growth, Brean Capital is looking forward to 2017, when it projects Apple will ship 237 million units. That would exceed the 232 million sold in 2015 and represent a new record for the company.

Apple has already indicated that it expects iPhone sales to see their first-ever decline in the March quarter. It will reveal the results of that three-month span in an earnings report scheduled to be issued on April 25.

Investors have expressed concern that the declines could continue past the March quarter and carry through the rest of 2016. In a more extreme projection, Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities said earlier on Monday that he believes iPhone shipments are likely to fall below 200 million units for the full year.

Apple launched its new 4-inch iPhone SE last week with an aggressive entry price of $399, but that model is not expected to outperform the company's flagship iPhone 6s series. A formal next-generation "iPhone 7" with an all-new design is widely anticipated to debut in September.

rotateleftbyte

All the other device makers would be drooling at the amount of profit 218M iPhones will make Apple
Yet the stick price will go down.
Time for the nay-sayers to start shorting it again?

Sad but a sign of the times.

foggyhill

That's "just" 10% difference for the other so called "analyst" Ming... Those guys are total dumbasses.
If enough throw a number out there, someone will be right and analysts as a herd (sic) will vindicated....

NY1822

Short interest ending 11/30/15:  108,372,153
Short interest ending   3/15/16:     52,659,928
Big money has already played the short game.
Now they want to ride it back up

quadra 610

Lol @ anyone who trusts the Breen. 

ceek74

Let's all jump on the bandwagon.  Thanks "analysts".  Apple is doomed.

ericthehalfbee

WWDC could turn these analysts on their heads. We've seen steady upgrades to iOS, but this year Apple could add some major features which could have just as much of an impact on sales as new hardware. For example:

- Major upgrade to the mail App. Make Outlook, Gmail and others irrelevant.
- Work/home setting with different home screen, Apps and so on.
- Multi user support for everyone (not just education). Could be tied into the work/home idea above.
- Default Apps, done the Apple way. That is, you can specify default Apps but with extra controls in place for privacy/security.
- Widgets/custom home screen. Take the existing icon layout and allow devs to make 1x2 horizontal, 2x1 vertical or 2x2 panels.
- Major updates for 3D Touch allowing users to do more customization as to what happens when you perform a touch.

There are always the die-hard Android users who will never consider an iPhone, but adding these features to iOS would, I'm sure, tempt a lot of them.

robjn

My own estimate is 256 million.

Apparently these analysts are not much respected by actual investors. Apple's price went up today despite their reports.

Investor's were much more impressed with Credit Suisse bullish Apple move.

hammerd2

Everyone else seemed to be predicting iPhone 7 would be the return to growth (in iPhone sales rather than profits) yet this one seems to think iPhone 8 will be the catalyst ? Based on....

None of them have any pedigree or reputation based on results of their guesses. They're licking their fingers and holding them  up to see which way the wond's blowing. Only share churn fuels their profits.  

Nonsense as usual. 

Apple profits will continue to rise and that should be all real investors care about. 

anantksundaram

NY1822 said:

Short interest ending 11/30/15:  108,372,153
Short interest ending   3/15/16:     52,659,928
Big money has already played the short game.
Now they want to ride it back up

Before blaming 'big money', are you sure you don't have cause and effect confused?

mdriftmeyer

Ironically, the return to growth is already happening with the iPhone SE

Countries like India will gobble them up.

avidthinker

Apple will actually sell 250M iPhones this year.  I just made that number up off the top of my head, just like the Brean Capital analyst did.  

Equally meaningless until Tim and Luca tell us what the actual number is in due time.

bestkeptsecret

I estimate Apple will sell 300M phones this year.

If I'm wrong, I nominate Sog to ban himself for a year on my behalf.

palomine

I wonder why brokers were all saying that the iPhone 7 will be when the stock recovers. I mean do they all drink at the same pub and decide these things? Lol

my opinion is that the investment pros are cycling from FANG to AAPL because the others have run up too high and AAPL run down too low for too long.  I think they are expecting a leveling off or decline in iPhone sales and AAPL should be a ten-bagger stock so they better run it up while they can, long sleep ahead until the car comes out.  That sounds so idiotic But I bet they think that way. 

Then if if apple increases sales this year they will go back to the "growth" vs "value" stock argument...again.