“Color me surprised. Just a few months ago, Apple announced its new phones, iPhone XR, along with the XS and XS Max — and I thought they had hit it out of the park. At the high end, the XS and XS Max continued the push toward bigger, more powerful phones, while the XR featured most of the benefits of its more expensive brethren at a more reasonable price,” Navneet Alang writes for The Week. “With Apple covering a broad swath of the market, I predicted a huge holiday quarter.
“It seems I was mistaken. Though it’s still too early to tell how bad things are, a pall now hovers over Apple as reports of cut production targets and weaker sales have sent the stock plummeting 25 percent,” Alang writes. “Goldman Sachs has downgraded the stock twice on worries Apple’s lineup is too expensive, too familiar, and just not appealing enough. Suddenly, it seems the sheen has come off the world’s most valuable company.”
MacDailyNews Take: That’s a lot of bullshit to spread with a shovel made only of thinly-sourced supply chain rumors.
“If I am a bit surprised,” Alang writes, “one imagines the execs at Apple are only more so.”
MacDailyNews Take: One imagines. The conceit of this piece takes quite a lot of imagining. The only thing surprising execs at Apple is how much they’re laughing while executing buybacks at a breakneck pace.
“The company has become perhaps the defining emblem of the digital age, its products and brand ubiquitous, its profits unprecedented,” Alang writes. “But perhaps it was just that success that led to the current situation — a mixture of hubris and comfort leading it to rest on its laurels.”
MacDailyNews Take: Plus monkeys like dry toast and ping pong balls while flying jet planes and… Hey, laaadddyyy!!!
“It’s hard not to get the sense that Apple is Icarus, and the wax holding its wings together is starting to melt,” Alang writes. “For years, Apple’s fanbase seemed willing to follow it anywhere, including the land of higher prices. But the company might be pushing that goodwill too far… Perhaps this was inevitable. There is a cultural effect that comes with market dominance in which companies become both complacent and defensive precisely because of their success.”
Full article – Think Before You Click™ – here.
MacDailyNews Take: “Seems.” “Might.” “Perhaps.” We sense a theme here.
Amid all of the noise of mindless Dvorakian blather, listen, here’s all you need to know:
When the lemmings, er… “analysts” start their upgrade parade, then you’ll know the bottom has been found. – MacDailyNews, November 26, 2018
In the meantime: Don’t get mad, get rich.
SEE ALSO:
Morgan Stanley projects Apple’s Services revenue to grow to $100 billion by 2023 – November 29, 2018
Apple VP: iPhone XR has been company’s best-selling model every day since it launched – November 28, 2018
Is Warren Buffett adding to Apple under $175? – November 26, 2018
Explaining the recent Apple selloff, and why the stock looks undervalued – November 23, 2018
Apple is no longer worth anywhere near one trillion dollars – November 23, 2018
Apple to lower iPhone XR pricing in Japan in order to boost sales – November 23, 2018
Why the bad news on Apple keeps on coming – November 23, 2018
In the darkest hour of Apple’s ‘white-knuckle period,’ some investors are loving it – November 21, 2018
Does hubris mean douchiness, or is it but a contributing component?
I don’t know why these people keep sprouting this BS – I know more people in the last couple of months who hav bought new iPhones way more than I can remember. Where is the news that Samsung or the others are having an uptick? People still need and buy phones. I have never met anyone who switched from an iPhone to Android and if they did they always came back. I think Apple is just fine and are still making money hand over fist.
Yes, Apple is paying dearly for its hubris…or I should say shareholders are paying for Pipeline’s hubris.
Pipeline let the Mac Mini rot for 4 years.
Pipeline let the Mac Pro rot for 4+ years.
Pipeline let the MacBook Air rot until it was so out of date NO publication would recommend it.
Pipeline let Aperture rot and then finally die.
Pipeline let Apple’s hard ware ecosystem rot and die (routers, monitors, etc).
All of Apple’s short comings have the same root cause: Pipeline and his feckless “leadership”.
Pipeline now sees that he can’t hide failures of his idiotic decisions and so has to hide them by keeping data from investors.
These investors are not as stupid as Pipeline is and so they made a mad dash for the exits.
A dash to the tune of $64/share. Pipeline knob slobbers call this market manipulation. Those with a brain call it a smart move.
Pipeline has consistently made miserable decisions regarding Apple hardware and software. See the Ars review of the new Mac Mini to see perfect examples of Pipeline’s feckless leadership.
Pipeline would rather wow people with large moving glass walls than producing a computer that everyone wants.
Pipeline would rather scour the earth for the perfect paper for his idiotic book than order that a Mac TV ad be made, or one for Apple Pay. No, Apple has no need for that. Let the perfect book be made says Pipeline.
Pipeline surrounds himself with lazy executives who have no fire whatsoever. None.
The hunger is gone from Apple.
The hunger to change the world, is gone.
Instead, Pipeline works his spreadsheet to see how much money he can suck out of loyal Mac users by soldering in the hard drive.
Pipeline has successfully ridden Steve Jobs’ coattails for many years. That cannot last forever. It cannot.
Pipeline’s time is coming to an end. The market sees what a complete and total fraud Pipeline is.
There is no leadership with Pipeline.
There is no inspiration when you listen to Pipeline. Watching grass grow is more exciting. Pipeline is a bore.
How low will the BOD of Apple allow the company to sink under the feckless leadership of the gutless Pipeline?
Microsoft knew they were sunk under the “leadership” of Steve Ballmer. Why can’t Apple’s board see the same under Pipeline?
The time to act is now. FIRE Pipeline!
And the replacement would be, who?
Botty!
Posted less than a week ago, guess you missed it:
Scott Forstall has the tech chops and years of experience under Steve that Pipeline can only dream about. Wikipedia: “it had been reported that Forstall was trying to gather power to challenge Cook.” Threatened is the only logical reason Scott was forced out for a specious reason (Apple Maps) considering his resume and accomplishments.
A recent MDN article quoted a former employee as he described the highly politicized atmosphere inside Apple under Cook. Constructive criticism valued by Steve is now out the window and treated unfavorably. That supports Cook as a “ruthless” leader on the inside and mild mannered face on the outside.
Reported Scott butted heads with Jony over issues such as FLAT iOS7 when Ive was promoted to SVP of design. Before that for years Steve and Scott were working together as the Apple visual gurus. So yes, Jobs always held him in the highest regard. More on Jony from Wikipedia: “Forstall had such a poor relationship with Ive and Mansfield that he could not be in a meeting with them unless Cook mediated; reportedly, Forstall and Ive did not cooperate at any level.” Scott knew the handwriting was on the wall as the power shift commenced. Also: “Forstall’s skeuomorphic design style, strongly advocated by former CEO Steve Jobs, was reported to have also been controversial and divided the Apple design team.” Translation: abstractionist Ive did not like it and won.
Early career resume from Wikipedia: “Forstall joined Steve Jobs’s NeXT in 1992 and stayed when it was purchased by Apple in 1997. Forstall was then placed in charge of designing user interfaces for a reinvigorated Macintosh line. In 2000, Forstall became a leading designer of the Mac’s new Aqua user interface, known for its water-themed visual cues such as translucent icons and reflections, making him a rising star in the company.”
Other career highlights:
* Supervised the creation of the Safari web browser
* Led the iPod team
* Won fierce competition to create iOS
* Responsible for creating a software developer’s kit for programmers to build iPhone apps
* 2006 on responsible for Mac OS X releases
* Took the stage launching the iPhone 4S to demonstrate first of a kind Siri
Wikipedia: “Forstall was very close to and referred to as a mini-Steve Jobs, so Jobs’ death left Forstall without a protector. Forstall was also referred to as the CEO-in-waiting by Fortune magazine and the book Inside Apple (written by Adam Lashinsky), a profile that made him unpopular at Apple.” Not a surprise. Power struggles are common in every workplace. Today, you don’t need a legitimate reason to force someone out to protect your own arse and your political buddies. Talent and experience has nothing to do with it if your manager is threatened.
No one on planet Earth is more qualified for Apple CEO. May the second genius prodigal son return and lead Apple higher…
Scott Foreskin had to go. He was circumised.
Siri was not first of a kind. Maybe on a phone, but Siri was also a purchase.
I did say iPhone 4S, duh…
Sorry, but you sound like the guy who was pissed at IBM because they slowed down on upgrading their typewriters. People kept typewriters in their business because the needed to be able to type multi-forms so that they could get a carbon copy of signatures and changes. There were some things that a desktop computer just couldn’t do. The rest of the world adapted/compromised, and found other ways to work. In fact, it took years before other innovations made carbon copies obsolete. Many people preferred them for many good reasons, but there was a tipping point. I believe we are very near that tipping point. No one in their right mind thought IBM was wrong to not keep heavily innovating typewriters
At some point in time, already now for billions of people, a highly advanced desktop/laptop computer is just not necessary. Maybe Apple has decided to leave that small amount of profit to the Dell’s of the world.
Desktop/Laptop computers are not obsolete, but neither were typewriters at one point. But all the money being spent went to computers.
If you are fixated on an updated state-of-the-art computer, maybe you should just switch. Or is it because you are hooked by Apple’s ecosystem that you are frustrated. Maybe the guy who really needed his typewriter was frustrated because he started out by needing both a typewriter and a desktop computer.
In the meantime, Cook, so far, has taken Steve Jobs’ brainchild ideas and executed them brilliantly. I believe that Jobs would agree. He, himself, envisioned desktop computers as trucks.
But we aren’t even asking for anything innovative, just stuff that Windows users take for granted: Expandability, slots, and compatibility.
You make some valid points. Where I take exception is that mobile computers only win at mobility. The more full featured computers do everything else better or can be easily adapted to do so.
Hardly typewriters. And mobility came at the expense of “personal”.
Certainly, some of your criticisms are valid, however since Jobs death AAPL has gone from about $50 to about $200 and it has been paying dividends as well. This may not please some, but as an investor I say Tim Cook has done a fine job. Also note that he was handpicked by Steve for the job and that Apple is not a dictatorship, rather it is run by a group of execs and a board of directors
Sheesh, Ishka is full of hate. What a loser! An r soul.
There seems to be an awful lot of people who are unhappy about paying premium prices for iPhones and it wasn’t always this way. I think they’re saying this because Android smartphones are so much less expensive with similar features as the iPhone. I’m not really certain. I just don’t know why there are so many people griping.
I’m not griping because Porsches or Lamborghinis are expensive and I can’t afford them. That’s just the way things are. There are always going to be products that some people can’t afford, but that’s no reason to get angry about it. Just work to make more money so you can afford them. I have no animosity towards Bugatti or Ferrari (or drivers of those supercars) and I have no reason to tell them to lower their prices just so I can buy one. I’ll just go and buy a car I can afford. So, I really don’t understand why all these people hate Apple when no one is being forced to buy their products.
Are all companies that sell high-priced products considered filled with hubris? The companies of Rolex, Tiffany, and Cartier must be overflowing with hubris. They’re just providing products for people who can afford them. Do they really have hordes of people just hating upon them because they sell relatively expensive products? I don’t even care about them because I can happily live without any of their products. What’s so especially terrible about Apple to upset so many people?
Saying this drop in Apple’s share price is Apple’s comeuppance is sort of ridiculous. There’s some sort of emotional foolishness being spread around. So many stocks go up and down in value and Apple is just one of them. Apple is just another company, although quite a successful one at that. Since when is success a bad thing for people to aspire to?
It’s hubris to even say the iPhone is the Rolex of it’s field, or the Porche or Lambo, or Tiffany or Cartier. The distance between those and the tier below them is so much bigger than the flagship phones today. Put another way with made up numbers…
5% of the population can afford a Lambo, etc.
30% of the population can afford an iPhone or competing model.
Hubris!
I would respectfully disagree. If you consider that being the best in the field is the way these products get that status, iPhone with its ecosystem is even more so. And without being as ridiculously more expensive.
I would respectfully AGREE. The high brow comparison is not applicable.
Bought the fully loaded first iPhone on day one in June 2007 for $600. About a month or two later Jobs lowered the price to $500 and I spent the $100 rebate in an Apple store.
My brother’s $20 on sale Android from Walmart voice assistant runs rings around Siri, not even a contest, and for the first time was jealous of the capability of Android.
The fully loaded newest flagship phone is now what, $1,500? That’s TRIPLE the price since 2007, unacceptable and yes, “hubris”…
“The high brow comparison is not applicable.”
Now why couldn’t I have put it that well?
Yes Apple has hubris. Most of this wish list would barely cost Apple anything, and is widely available in $400 windows boxes.
New iMac wish list:
Hard drive slot. If a Sony playstation can have this, there is no excuse for a Mac not having one. External drives with tangles of wires are inelegant and add failure potential.
HDMI input. You’ve got that wonderful 5k screen, why can’t we connect stuff to it? Cable TV, Playstation, live camcorder output, even a second computer. It’s a huge waste of space to need a TV right next to your iMac. (Also, a hardware button for switching inputs.)
Front accessible ports for SD cards, USB sticks, and headphones. RCA output for connecting to a stereo. People use this stuff, and having to turn your computer is another risk for damaging wires or unplugging things unexpectedly.
Sliding lens cap for FaceTime camera. You told us once it was unhackable. It never will be.
Real keyboard and mouse. (See Naga hex, lights not necessary. Working drivers are.)
Front facing speakers because that is where the user is, duh.
Mac compatibility. Stop breaking our software. Future Macs will still be able to run 32 bit software – if it is for windows!
Nobody cares about making it a millimeter thinner! Add an inch just to remind yourself that it doesn’t matter, and maybe allow for some heat dissipation.
So this guy is cOvering his own perception (ass) of getting it totally wrong, he now decides about the apparent appeal of these new products by blaming Apple for producing products without sufficient appeal. All of course totally speculative with it for added amusement. Pot and kettle very much comes to mind… Not to mention panic and embarrassment on his part.
the stock fall is caused by overblown rumours. The new phones are great except missing a ‘small’ model
that said Apple has been neglecting or slow on things like Mac and SIRI etc
HUBRIS means ‘pride before the fall’
I’m afraid to say too much in case apple senior managers get angry and take their designer chairs, past those giant cafeteria doors and sulk in their fruit garden with their copies of silver edged bespoke ‘ Apple Only’ ink Coffee Table Books with their lattes ‘available at 4 temperatures’ instead of working.
YMMV, but as a stockholder and customer, I’m increasingly concerned about Apple’s future.
Specifically, despite being a $1T market cap corporation, they neglected to reinvest in the full width of their Macintosh core business lines, and has instead become a “one product deep” company with the iOS ecosystem: the target demographic is a highly fickle one … just as RIM, Sony, Nokia … and when the iPhone falls out of favor — such as by being pushed there with ridiculously high prices — then Apple is going to fall on their face and a good 50% of its income stream is going with it.
Oh, but “Services!”, right? Nope. They’re overwhelmingly tied to iOS adoption, so they’re not a form of diversification and risk reduction.
How about Project Titan? Well, there’s been something that’s been a huge money & attention suck, thats for sure. Problem is that it still hasn’t panned out to a viable product, let alone one that will be profitable, and Apple’s track record of being a groundbreaker has been much poorer than people realize: what Apple has executed well has been to be what I”ll call the “Derivative Product of Excellence”: the iPod wasn’t the first MP3 player, but in its time it was arguably the best one. Ditto the Desktop Mac, smartphone, etc – – in every case, someone else came first and showed that there was market potential before Apple.
But unfortunately, we’ve seen far too many basic execution errors by Apple over the past half decade. The debacle of the Trash Can Mac Pro (despite the Cube precursor); the butterfly keyboard in search of another half millimeter of thinness; SSDs which cost 3x retail market prices; smartphones which now cost 2x more than their initial “outrageous” price; “form before function” designs which result in extensive thermal overload induced throttling of performance in every product, and so on.
As much as fans like to compare Apple to the likes of Porsche, this isn’t how Porsche runs their business.
YMMV, but as a stockholder and customer, I’m increasingly concerned about Apple’s future.
Specifically, despite being a cash-rich $1T market cap corporation, they neglected to reinvest in the full width of their Macintosh core business lines, and has instead become a “one product deep” company with the iOS ecosystem: the target demographic is a highly fickle one … just as RIM, Sony, Nokia … and when the iPhone falls out of favor — such as by being pushed there with ridiculously high prices — then Apple is going to fall on their face and a good 50% of its income stream is going with it.
Oh, but “Services!”, right? No. No because they’re overwhelmingly tied to iOS adoption, so that segment does not represent a form of diversification and risk reduction.