“During its holiday quarter, Apple sold 5.5 million more iPhones than expected and earned $18 billion in profit. Total revenue of about $75 billion was 12% more than expected,” Peter Cohan writes for Forbes.
“Moreover, revenue in China soared 70% to $16.1 billion,” Cohan writes. “And its potential for growth there is significant since it has four stores there now and plans 40 by mid-2016, according to the Washington Post.”
“Given all this good news, what could possibly be wrong with Apple?” Cohan writes. “Here are six things that should give investors pause.”
1. Expensive stock
2. Tumbling smartphone prices
3. Declining margins
4. Shrinking iPad sales
5. Overhyped Apple Watch
6. Inability to innovate
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Let’s all gather ’round to gawk at the village idiot, shall we?
Some advice for Cohan: When you do not understand a subject, it’s best to write about something else; something you understand. You know, like protective helmets and drool cups.
Related articles:
Apple iPhone No. 1 in China smartphone market share – January 27, 2015
Apple Inc. posts biggest quarterly earnings of any company ever – January 27, 2015
Apple destroys Street with all-time record earnings – January 27, 2015
A giant Asteroid can come at anytime and wipe us all out. This scenario falls in line with this Forbes Global Village idiot! lol
Quite hilarious – this clown’s article. All his childish analysis is “supported” by “data” from IDC and CEA – which we know both have amazing trackrecords of always being so accurate. Ok you took a breather, now shove your head back up your rear-end, Peter Cohan.
What an idiot!
Yeah, from the headline, I thought it was another article by our favorite convicted SEC stock fraud manipulator who’s name I won’t use as I don’t want to advertise his new business.
A totally complete idiot. His list is utterly ridiculous:
1. Expensive stock – Stock expense is judged by investors who see it likely to be worth the investment, nothing more
2. Tumbling smartphone prices – I was unaware of the ‘tumble’ in Apple smartphone prices. Their prices remain high and they are selling all they can build resulting in…. you guessed it…. high stock value!
3. Declining margins – Apples margins are the highest in the industry resulting in… drumroll please… high stock value!
4. Shrinking iPad sales- This happens usually right before a new iPad is due out as people wait for the new model.
5. Overhyped Apple Watch – Overhyped? Given it has not even gone on sale yet, a price has not been announced, and future orders cannot be placed even, how can anyone even guess whether it has been “overhyped” or not?
6. Inability to innovate – Given the massive sales of Apple products, whether they have innovated or not is easily recognized in the carnage that Apple has created in many areas. Their ‘market disruption’ in the music, video, books, and other major industries is legendary. They have fundamentaly transformed so many industries precisely because of not only their ability to innovate, but refusing to bring to market LOSERS. Apple is far better than many companies at NOT bringing to market garbage. Products such as Google glass (a flop), and Microsoft’s new hologram glasses are examples of products being released and hyped long before they are ready for prime time. Apple rarely introduces a product until it is ready. The market ‘gets’ this. This idiot has yet to grasp this.
A pre requisite for every analist should be to put their money where their running mouths are and invest their wages and savings according to their advice, especially regarding Apple.
“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.” – A. Lincoln
Methinks that Cohan might do well to review his Lincoln before even thinking about writing one more word. Hit whore or total ignoramus – what say ye, denizens of MDN?
Thought that was Mark Twain?
Confucius, even?
“Even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise; when he closes his lips he is deemed intelligent.”
– Proverbs 17:28 (ESV)
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/abrahamlin109276.html
In all fairness, the quote has as often (if not more often) been ascribed to Mark Twain, although, it is one of those for which the specific origin (a speech, an essay or whatever) cannot be traced with certainty for either of the two…
Putting the M in the word MORON, congrats Mr. Cohan!!!
Can we delete the word innovate and any related words from the English language please? It has become meaningless as people just use it all the time without any real idea as to what they mean by it. Innovation comes in many forms and of varying scales. There could be massive innovation in a perhaps a small area, which in the grand scheme of things may not be headline grabbing, but business (and life) is not just about headlines. If Apple weren’t so great across the board, all the whizz bang products in the world would be meaningless.
You want to witness innovation? This guy….. well… DO YOUR HOMEWORK PEOPLE!!!!…. He is right up there with Steve Jobs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Kamen
Look deeper into the water purification system…THAT HE INNOVAAAAAAAAATTTED!!!!! Unlike JUNK PUSHER, COPIERS IN THE EAST!!!!
The Apple philosophy goes Much MUCH deeper than the almighty monetary Dollar $$$$$$$$$. Yeah Think That IS Different. Bunch O PC DOLTS. Hows that restructure coming along MIKEY!! A-Hole.
Innovate/innovation has been on the top of my most hated word list for some time now. Somehow it’s replaced “synergy” as the most abused buzzword, but at least synergy retained actually meaning.
This guy is a teacher? No wonder the analysts are idiots, if they go to his school.
Time and again, the market has proven that the “idiots” are the retail investors that “buy the top” of a stock trading at bubble prices.
The iWatch may be the tulip, we’ll see.
The *Apple* Watch is unlikely to be the “tulip” preceding AAPL’s fall.
If you consider AAPL to be overpriced, then you should have invested in Microsoft a couple of weeks ago. Such a solid company…I hear that Microsoft investors are quite pleased with recent events – not.
Seriously, equating the current state of AAPL with a price bubble?
Please tell me how to tell when a stock is topping out in price. I missed that psychic ability in investment class.
One thing that does scare me a little is Apple seems to be reliant on iPhone sales for these big quarters. Most of the sales are iPhones and if that ever shrinks its going to hurt one way or another.
Now that is actually a worthy input. I don’t know why you were down voted for it.
The iPhone is Apple’s dominant product in terms of revenue and profit. Slowing sales or reduced prices/gross margins will significantly impact Apple’s bottom line. People who are focusing on iPad sales or the upcoming Apple Watch are truly missing the boat. But the good news is that Apple’s cash cow is expanding into China with plenty of room yet to grow before tailing off in the long term into a more stable replacement phase.
As Bill Murray said in GroundHog Day… “Morons your bus is leaving…” and this author has is own shiny blue helmet that his mommy gave him for Christmas!”
Bing!
Most epic FUD ever!
These articles are nothing more than clickbait. Given Apple’s massive war chest, and their product’s pervasion into society, they aren’t going anywhere. There are now 1 billion iOS devices in circulation. A day will come when Apple isn’t as big as it is today, it’s the natural evolution of a successful company. But are they doomed? Nope, nada, not even remotely close. Look at Microsoft, as an example, there are 1.25 billion active PCs using a version of Windows. They keep on turning out profitable quarters, yet ANALysts keep saying they are doomed. Paaalease!
This one is my favorite:
1. Expensive stock
Oh really? And how about Google, Amazon…, a bunch of blowhard companies that are just too Gee Golly Whiz not to have their prices fall into the land of reality. Meanwhile, Apple leaps forward every year with the new and the best and can’t get respect from pustules like Peter Cohan who writes for Forbes.
My second favorite is:
6. Inability to innovate
I love this one because it’s one of those wonderful litmus tests of stupidity. I wonder who this cyst thinks does innovate, if not Apple. On second thought, I don’t care what he thinks. 😛
Just waiting for Perma Canadian Blair to top this nonsense!!
Why post the link? Click bait – all thee writers want. They know Apple fans will show up, give them hits and fill their comments section. And when these really bad, no following writers are desperate – they stick Jobs name in a title.
Don’t click people.
Come on people. It’s as justme says. This is hit whoreing, this guy doesn’t believe what he is writing. It’s a headline to enrage people, suck them into the Forbes website and create hits.
Don’t give them the oxygen that spreads their tomfoolery or the pleasure they derive from their sad non productive job.
The reason why MDN links to this? Because all of this part of the same Media Churn Beast, MDN, Forbes, this chump, we the commenters, etc. If you disapproved of the article and also disapprove of MDN linking to it, then aren’t you just adding to it by commenting? It’s all just entertainment, really.
Hit troll and all around loser! Nothing to see here people move along.
Looking at his points …
1) The stock is expensive – Well it was a lot cheaper a few months ago. When a stock does well, it becomes more expensive.
2) Tumbling smartphone prices – That’s true for any manufacturer not named Apple. Apple’s average selling price has substantially increased.
3) Declining margins – Gross margin went up from 37.9% to 39.9% compared to the same quarter last year. No other tech manufacturing company can earn margins anything like those that Apple earns.
4) Shrinking iPad sales – Which are more than covered by increased iPhone and MacBook sales. Products which generate higher profits too.
5) Overhyped Apple watch – Nobody knows that until it goes on sale. It’s certainly got Swiss watch manufacturers worried and they don’t worry easily.
6) Inability to innovate – Apple Watch is an innovative take on the smartwatch idea. Apple Pay is an innovative solution to contactless payments and is already. These are two innovative products that have appeared since Steve died. Apple’s existing A series chips are delivering levels of performance that rivals are struggling to match in future versions. Cohan keeps insisting that Apple has lost it’s mojo.
Cohan demonstrates that he has no understanding of how Apple works or why it succeeds. The fact that Forbes choose to publish such flawed nonsense reflects very poorly on them.
To see a great example of Cohan’s nonsense being savagely debunked, you can’t do much better than the Macalope did last July.
http://www.macworld.com/article/2455556/a-steady-decline.html
Or for even more laughs, you could always check out the Maclope’s response to Cohan’s “7 reasons why Apple is more doomed than you think” from April 2013. Cohan’s reasons at that time include –
Apple is no longer the world’s biggest company
Apple has nothing new in the pipeline
Without Jobs, Apple can’t innovate
Introducing a cheaper iPhone will mark the end of Apple’s leadership
Apple is not well positioned strategically
http://www.macworld.com/article/2036318/macalope-contribution-not-required.html
Nice catch. I enjoy seeing those fools caught with their pants down.
I’ve worked with some of these people.
They’ve hated Apple forever because they were “smart enough” to learn DOS, while Apple users used icons.
Awesome points.
I made sure I got my two cents of a comment in on that Forbes article. People like him are entitled to their opinions but I think his article is rather useless. $178 billion in the bank will provide Apple with all the resources it could possibly ever need to stay relevant. That being said, there are never any guarantees if something terrible happens to the economy or a world war happens or that massive asteroid strike.
Why, oh why, are idiots like Peter Cohan allowed to hold these positions?
1. Expensive stock — Why was this not a problem when it was $700 pre-split? Why is this not a problem for any other company? Why is Apple doomed for having the best quarter ever?
2. Tumbling smartphone prices — If you mean the really shitty phones with questionable CPUs And Randroid™, then yes.
3. Declining margins — Seems that the price of iPhones hasn’t changed, but I imagine parts have become cheaper, so is this really an issue so far?
4. Shrinking iPad sales — Yeah,, ok. They *only* sold 21,000,000. That said, there are two things keeping the iPad from growing in my mind. First is the longevity of the iPad. My iPad 3 is going strong, even in abusive, 6-year-old hands. There’s no need to replace that for him anytime soon. Accordingly, my iPad Air does everything the iPad 3 did with no stuttering or hesitation. Secondly, a new iPad needs to do something more — blur the lines a bit between iOS and traditional computer. Give me file access and minor multitasking, such as watching a movie in a second window while using Safari.
5. Overhyped Apple Watch — Everyone said the same thing about the iPhone, 6 months before it was released. How about we wait and see actual numbers?
6. Inability to innovate — I keep forgetting that innovation not only takes no time at all, but Mr. Cohan has insider clearance at Apple to see the (lack of) innovation firsthand.
People like Peter Cohan need to justify their jobs and the only way to bring visitors and keep ad revenue going is to make an article with Apple in the headline. I think this needs to be an official Take To Task article…
MDN – Perhaps add your trademarked 🙂 quote, “Think, before you click”. Or perhaps you just want to point out a train wreck? Regardless, I did not want to give the bozo another link hit.
Not gonna click– matter of fact, I want my 30 seconds back
More evidence that the profession of journalism has been infiltrated by carnival barkers selling snake oil to rubes.
Go the extra mile, folks:
http://www.babson.edu/academics/faculty/profiles/pages/cohan-peter.aspx
pcohan@babson.edu
Apples best and biggest innovation is that at Apple they ‘Think Different.’ The results speak for themselves. 😀