“Apple shares are up 18 percent this year, with the latest good news coming in the form of Apple’s first-quarter earnings report,” Alex Rosenberg reports for CNBC.
“Meanwhile, Apple bears are hurting. And one market strategist says that it’s time for them to seek professional help,” Rosenberg reports. “‘We would encourage those professionals who love to hate AAPL to book themselves a series of therapy appointments,’ said Neil Azous, a market advisor with Rareview Macro. ‘This story for Apple just has a lot of legs to go higher. And it’s very difficult when you look at the combination of their guidance, their capital redeployment plans, and their margins, to be pretty negative on the stock, when you think about it in the medium-term.'”
“The therapy is required, says Azous, because skepticism about the stock runs so deep as to border on pathological,” Rosenberg reports. “‘When you look at what they’re geared to going forward, it has so many things that people disbelieve in, such as, it’s geared to China, emerging markets, new products that people don’t want to embrace. And when you’re in that big of a situation of denial, it requires a certain set of therapy’ sessions.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Ahh, another guy who gets it!
Most of Wall Street, even the Apple bulls (and plenty of fools), do not yet have a firm grasp on the magnitude of what’s in store.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Scott M.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Cantor Fitzgerald ups Apple price target to $195; says Apple Watch will be its best-selling new product ever – April 29, 2015
Analyst wonders whether iPhone sales growth has peaked – April 28, 2015
Wow, someone else that didn’t get the memo.
Wonder how long until we never hear of Alex again?
Alex’s thoughts certainly run counter to the norm from CNBC.
Back in the early 70’s I used to watch my father-in-law read Barron’s religiously every day, and then he’d recap for me all the reasons why any optimism about a stock or anything economic was ignorant. He was convinced that anyone who had real insider information knew just how bad things actually were, and that if you thought things were going well in any regard you were naive and just didn’t understand. He would give you all kinds of convoluted theories gleaned from his readings that proved that we were constantly on the doorstep of disaster. If you didn’t believe this you were simply uninformed.
It’s hard to blame him. He was a child of the great depression. He was constantly on guard against disaster and shortage. Oddly, reading an article that confirmed his insecurities was actually a comfort to him, in that it reinforced his unfounded belief that things were about to unravel. It quieted his cognitive dissonance when he looked out the window to see customers lining up to fight over the goods we sold at exorbitant prices, but he just knew in his heart of hearts that it couldn’t last.
The various financial publications, stock brokers, and analysts that have been in business for 50 years or more have not ignored this market. In fact, this is the dominant culture on Wall Street. Things may look good now, but experience tells us that disaster is just around the corner. Never forget that these people make money by selling advice, and giving people the advice they want to hear sells better than giving them realistic advice, precisely because advice based on reality makes them uncomfortable.
These customers are the people who didn’t buy AAPL because they have always been sure that such a high flying, optimistic, risk taking company is bound to fail. Their signature trait is being massively risk averse. Consequently, they lay in the weeds hoping to be able to sagely say at some point, “I told you so.” Any article, news letter, broker, or analyst who reinforces their beliefs will make money selling advice to them.
The only question is how long it will take for that generation of investors, and those they have influenced to decide that doom and gloom is no longer a money maker, or defensible in any way. Until then we will continue to see articles that start with the premise that Apple is bound to fail, and then construct “facts” to support that argument.
Should have read: “…or defensible in any way to die off.”
Disregard my last. Sheesh! I wish MDN had an “edit/delete post” feature.
Yep. My dad lived thru the great depression and it was amazing how much of an impact that had on him years later in daily life.
He did get good at stock picks but boy did he research the heck out of them first. Right up until his last year he watched the money, but after seeing his own father lose two houses, his car and high paying job in the 30’s, I don’t blame him. It was a different mind set after that.
The other issue with Wall Street is the leaches that want to earn a billion quickly and will lie, cheat and steal to do it. Counterfeit stock and the numbers games with millisecond buys and sells is insane.
music to the ears of long time Apple fans everywhere!
I called a friend Monday to celebrate the great Q1/2015 AAPL financial news, to which she said, “Oh God no! That ought to tank the stock!” I laughed at her “joke” at the time. Not so much now. Good news=bad news for AAPL; either way, “sell on AAPL news,” right?
Fortunately, this is likely a short-term effect and nothing to really worry about. I do look forward to the day when there is a tax repatriation holiday. That will be one glorious day to remember for Apple shareholders. I try to continue to think positive about Apple despite all the weird BS that goes on with Wall Street.
Not just a tax holiday. A permanent tax REFORM. The foreign made profits tax has to be chopped, ideally in half as a starter. #MyStupidGovernment is literally nuts to keep up this barrier to bringing foreign made profits from entering the USA. Literally nuts.
I’m looking at YOU Carl Levin.
I saw you *ding* me down Carl! Shame on you!
Apple Bears in the media, who keep touting the ‘doom’ rubbish are usually paid by competitors, the boardrooms/CEO’s of numerous companies that are @..t scared of what Apple Inc. is heaping upon them.
Dear citizens of the free world, nearly the whole country has descended into a hate festival and this therapy proposal is akin to getting a patient to admit to torture the prescribing a dismissive move forward to approach so that the offensive dehumanizing behavior continue.
They are way to far gone for therapy to be of use, they even believe themselves above the law and avoid the Hague like the plague. Nope, it’s in the hand of karma now and it’s showing itself to be a real bitch.
So keep a healthy supply of popcorn on hand.
Dear ‘road warrior’.
a. Look up the term ‘karma’ before using it in a public forum again.
b. Stop taking crack.
From personal experience, I suspect Road Warrior’s caffeine titer dropped off a cliff mid-way through the first sentence.
*Cue The Popeye Music*
Coffee to the rescue! 😉
Wasn’t that spinach?
One person’s spinach is another person’s coffee… 😉
Well I do love spinach, it’s one of the many things I love, and it’s good and healthy for you too. Not bad for therapy either, a close relative is often heard promoting a lettuce help you program for Apple hating vegetarians who just want to be leafed alone.
Sure Space Cadet:
1. Karma: the principle of causality where intent and actions of an individual influence the future of that individual.
2. I’ve never done crack, but by all means try again to insult me, it’s the american way.
😆😂
We told you so, Apple Bear Bullshitters.
So much for we Apple advocates being a crazy arrogant cult.
Instead the key words are:
INSIGHTFUL
HELPFUL
💪😄👍🙆👊
DC. How many of those AAPL Bears know what a Mac IIci is? … A quality Apple product that boots to this day.
Quad 9500 still works great.
Original iPod Touch in use daily.
15″ iMac Still going strong.
20″ Intel iMac workhorse cranks it out day to day.
Original iPad as good as the day it was delivered.
24″ iMac a thing of beauty still going.
iPod Mini still singing along.
MacBook Pro Retina oversees it all.
I have others to describe…. My point? These WallShit Schmucks have NO FCKIN CLUE about Apple Computer Inc. 😉 Cheers!
The best has yet to come from AAPL.
*sigh* I recently had to let go of my 1997 Power Mac 9600. It was a great server for well over a decade. I still have my 1998 PowerBook PDG Wallstreet around for running old software.
Skimming over the surface of technology then daring to write about it on a professional level does not work. Too many people attempt to do exactly that with entirely predictable results.
it’s not just the analysts but also a lot of investment managers who have this bizarre hatred of Apple. That’s why the stock is so low with a P.E lower than Goog, Msft and a fraction of Netflix and Amazon. PE of the most successful company in the world is lower than the S&P AVERAGE.
Example: some years ago I pulled out a ‘Tech’ mutual fund from my bank because in it’s group of stocks it had NO aapl, it had Dell, HP, Msft, RIM etc but no Apple! Totally bizarre. that’s during a time when Apple was on a tear with Jobs.
I can only conclude that many investment guys are EXTREME Windows PC users, they have been Excel (‘greatest program on Earth’) PC guys from day one, — together with their ‘real’ working phones the Blackberry. They’ve been downing Apple for years maybe decades (most of the managers are middle aged) and buying ‘the Toy company’ really (consciously or subconsciously ) upsets them, it’s like attacking their own id or ego or something… It’s like asking an extreme greenie (Greenpeace supporting, Orca T-shirt) to buy Oil-sands stock.
I bet you because of the above a lot of mutual funds, company retirement funds, funds from small banks etc simply refuse to buy apple, or buy very little relatively or if they own it will sell it at the first hint of BS bad news from their also PC using analyst brethren.
(I know it does not sound rational – investment should be ‘rational’ – but human beings — with their hobbies, love or hate — are often ‘not rational’ .. look at it the FUNDAMENTALS of apple so strong yet the P.E is so low and it’s been like that for YEARS ).
(btw my own accountant (a nice guy but a PC Excel wizard ) told me to sell all my aapl a few years ago… I didn’t sell a share and am glad)
Michael Blair, we’re talking to you. 😇
Therapy? What wussies this people must be.
I think many people make stock picks based entirely on emotion. It’s like rooting for a favorite sport team. And since a majority of investors don’t understand fundamentals they buy companies they personally use. And even though a WS investor should know fundamentals, sometimes they use emotions to make investment decisions. For example Cramer a few years ago said his 20-year-old daughter didn’t like Apple so he told people to sell. Another example is a 80-year-old relative of mine that has been a pro for years, but still asks various family members their opinions on products. He doesn’t invest in tech because he doesn’t understand it, but will invest in a coffee making machine company because it’s simple.
Many here have been involved with tech in some way or another throughout the years and realize how great of an investment/company Apple is. I was a Microsoft guy almost all my life and then Android. I hated Apple because it meant more time for me and with 5 percent market share at the time why should I bother? My opinion started to changed after the iPhone 3GS, but I still made fun of Apple with the first iPad. It was just a big-ass iPhone, right? I bought a Samsung tablet running Windows 7 and my mom bought the first iPad. A short time after, my plastic Samsung tablet started falling apart and my high-end Android phone never received updates, got malware, the storage card failed, the back cover broke, etc, etc. People I knew that had iPhones either never had issues or had minor issues that Apple either fixed or replaced with a new iPhone. My mom’s iPad never had issues. She now owns an iPad Air and Mini.
If these WS investors don’t want to look at the fundamentals then they need to ask a tech guy about their opinion: Apple’s products are not complicated because they are fundamentally just as simple as a coffee maker: the iPhone, iPad, Mac and now the Apple Watch make people happy.