gmgravytrain

People in China simply do not need to pay what Apple is charging for an iPhone. They don't need iPhones at all if they're only going to be using WeChat. A $200 Android smartphone is all they need to accomplish whatever they want as long as they're using WeChat. WeChat does practically everything. Almost no consumer in India can afford even the cheapest model iPhone and that's why Apple has about 1% smartphone market share in India. A $200 Android smartphone should be more than good enough for any consumer living at the poverty-class level.

Basically, Apple has priced itself out of two of the largest smartphone markets and now has no way of recovering market share percentage. Apple needs to stop depending upon iPhone unit sales and should find some other business(es) to increase overall revenue. I don't know why Apple ignored getting a cloud business like most of the other major tech companies acquired. The cloud business is considered a long-term growth business.

Apple should have easily seen how their iPhone business was a dead-end, no growth business, especially with only the poorest countries left to do business with. How can Apple possibly sell $1000 iPhones to people with extremely low yearly salaries? I just don't know what Apple was thinking when it keeps raising iPhone prices every year. There's no way Apple can stay competitive in such a mature market. There's almost nothing Apple can do to make an iPhone stand out in value to such a high degree.

I don't know if iPhones are "too" expensive. I only know that consumers seemed to have stopped buying them in the quantities they once did. That's likely the end result of Apple's price-jacking strategy. Although I'm a long-term Apple shareholder, I don't think Apple should have to charge so much for iPhones if consumers aren't going to buy them.

Trying to sell more iPhones seems like a poor strategy for Apple to pursue. The smartphone market is done for Apple. Apple has to look elsewhere for maintaining or increasing revenue. It's hard to believe Apple was once a trillion-dollar company. The fall was so quick.  I don't know how Apple could have been so short-sighted.

brucemc said:

lewchenko said:

They are still delusional to think it will be back at 236 within a year I think. 

and I would disagree that the post above that the  markets are usually down this time of year. Quieter and flatter perhaps , but not down as much as they are. That’s due to exceptional circumstances this year and in apples case a series of bad news to go on top. 

I got lucky and sold everything I had at 227 (main reason for selling was the sky high prices they were now charging.. smelled fishy)

Key question is whether to get back in yet.  Gut says it’s gonna go lower (150 easily) before it slowly recovers back to 200 by mid next year. 

But it I do agree with the analysts that apple has a problem. And cranking up the prices is not going to work in the long run of unit sales keep falling (which they will at the prices they are now charging) . All stocks are priced for future profit, hence why it’s falling. Hiding the unit sales after years of showing them also says you have something to hide. 

It's true.  Apple has absolutely no clue about where to go next.  If only they had invested in wearables or services or something...

I'm a bit puzzled as to why Apple didn't see this coming years ago and forked away from iPhone dependency. Smartphone market saturation was clearly going to happen with all those cheap Android smartphones being cranked out 24/7/365. Apple will still be the most profitable smartphone maker but it seems that's not important to big investors. If Apple is struggling then how do all those other smartphone makers survive? That's something I can't quite figure out.

Still, a smartphone purchase cycle of 2 to 3 years is quite decent for any electronic device. I don't think Apple will be hurt by that if it unit sales can be held flat over that period. Apple just needs to look into other revenue streams to make additional cash flow. I'm no financial genius but I think Apple is a long way from going out of business although Wall Street makes it out to be that way. I'll survive if Apple no longer has the highest market cap in the world. I do think Apple may be trying to hide decreasing iPhone unit sales by not reporting those numbers but what else can they do if the well is running dry. It might be a good way to buy time until Apple can figure out some new business strategy.

It's good the news media is pounding on Apple and going to extremes to say Apple is a failing, no growth company. More big investors will continue dumping and Apple will be able to buy back more stock at lower prices. Rumors shouldn't hurt long-term Apple investors, only day-traders or greedy fund managers. I'm willing to bet Buffett is continuing to buy Apple stock at a discount. Apple's P/E is just crazy low and doesn't seem representative of any tech stock. NVidia has slid almost 50% from its highs and still has a P/E of 19. Apple has a lousy P/E of 14 representing the value of a struggling steel mill. Talk about a low-valued stock and that's Apple. Anyway, I don't care as long as I continue to get my dividends. Let the news media have its fun crapping on Apple. I feel Apple will still stay a strong company even if iPhone sales decline.