Research firm Canalys predicts that “phone shipments will rise this year, even though Apple is projected to see its first-ever annual decline in iPhone shipments,” Tiernan Ray reports for Barron’s. “Canalys projects shipments this calendar year of 1.4 billion units, a 5% year-over-year increase. Apple is expected by Wall Street to see a 9% decline in unit shipments of the iPhone in the fiscal year ending in September, being seeing its sales lift again in fiscal ’17 by 5%. Given that outlook, the market get a little lift from a forthcoming iPhone, the presumed ‘iPhone 7,’ says analyst Ishan Dutt, but overall, Apple has not helped the market by shipping an underwhelming iPhone ‘6s’ series.”
“Another bright spot is a note today from John Vinh of Pacific Crest Securities, who writes that the inventory situation in sales channels of mobile devices has improved,” Ray reports. “‘Busier store traffic due to the summer holidays and ongoing promotions drove strong sell-through in July,’ writes Vinh, ‘and resulted in inventories trending to the low end of targeted levels of 6-10 days, which we view as healthy.'”
Now, it all hangs on iPhone 7: “While we are encouraged by lean inventory levels ahead of the launch of the iPhone 7 and the Galaxy Note 7, ultimately 2H16 performance of mobile supply-chain stocks is more likely to be determined by how well the iPhone 7 sells through after it is launched in September.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Death to the S!
Hopefully Apple has now woken up and the iPhone 6s/Plus will be the last iPhones stupidly saddled with the “S” moniker.
There are plenty of numbers in the universe. Infinite, actually. Don’t worry, Apple, you won’t run out. – MacDailyNews, October 4, 2011
SEE ALSO:
Apple, enough with the stupid iPhone ‘S’ naming already – September 16, 2015
“Smartphone shipments to rise in 2016”
But… but… but… that’s not what Oppenheimer Funds senior toady analcyst Andrew Uerkwitz just said…
I still think this is lame-ass analysis. It seems like they analyze snapshots of data with no context. The 6 Series iPhones absorbed a huge amount of pent up desire for a larger phone. Much of what would have normally been 6S sales potential was absorbed in the original 6 launch by people upgrading earlier than their normal 2-year cycle. The 6S was never underwhelming. There was simply a smaller market for ANY new iPhone due to the massive success of the 6. This SHOULD be obvious even to a Wall Street analyst.
Understanding the obvious is not analysts forte. Their job seems to be to obfuscate and guess.
Actionable research nonsense from the analysts doing the rounds to cause buy/sell churn in AAPL, nothing else!!
Google’s plan is working well. Basically fill up the entire smartphone market with low-cost smartphones and leave nothing for Apple’s iPhone business. It’s a very simple plan and yet Apple wasn’t smart enough to recognize it. Apple could have been going after Google’s search/ad business in turn for a number of years but decided against it. In a way, Apple has been digging its own grave by giving everything away to Google without much of a fight. It’s no wonder investors happily pay 30X revenue for Alphabet stock than grudgingly pay 12X revenue for Apple stock.
Apple is painting itself into a corner every time Tim Cook opens his mouth. He’s wasting his time speaking because no one believes a word of what he has to say about how Apple still has life as a company. He’s definitely no Elon Musk.
It goes without saying the analysts will quickly inform investors how the iPhone 7 will be a huge failure long before Apple introduces it to the public. The perception is how the iPhone 7 and its sales will be underwhelming and everyone on Wall Street already believes it. If iPhone 7 fails to meet sales expectations by even just a tiny bit, the stock will be ripped to shreds. Apple is seen to have no value apart from iPhones.
I agree Apple needs to cut Google’s Search & ads action off at the knees and maybe they think a future Siri search model will do just that.