“If a business fails to take care of its customers, its customers will go elsewhere. Every businessman knows this to be true, and for those who are prudently observing the trend in one of our giants, forward risks become a reality,” Thomas H. Kee Jr., president and CEO of Stock Traders Daily writes for MarketWatch. “In the case of Apple, this is happening in front of our eyes, and the risks are therefore very high. Apple has stopped serving their customers well, and unless they start to serve their customers better the company will begin to lose more market share and revenue and earnings projections will come down aggressively.”
“Most people think Apple’s customers are the end user, but because Apple relies so heavily on third-party resellers like Verizon and Sprint, both of which are feeling margin contraction and negative effects on earnings because of the extremely high cost of iPhones, the real customers are third-party resellers, and Apple is not treating them right,” Kee writes. “As long as margins and earnings are negatively affected by sales of Apple’s products, those resellers will look for alternatives and eventually they will find them. Nothing could be clearer.”
“We all know that Apple’s products were revolutionary, but they are not nearly as elite as they were… Now, nothing in Apple’s arsenal is compelling enough to command multiples as high as recent growth rates. To any doubters, look at the past growth rates versus current market multiples; Wall Street already sees this coming,” Kee writes. “It [sic] you own AAPL and you are expecting the company to grow like it has in the past, you are sorely mistaken. Apple is not what it was… Apple is not respecting customer needs, and until this changes Apple is a sell.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Kee offers zero evidence that Verizon and Sprint feel that “Apple is not treating them right.”
The tale will be told when Apple reports Q112 earnings on January 24th. And, at every significant milestone that AAPL hits, our iCal icons will bounce in our Docks and Kee will be fed and re-fed his crow with relish. We’re nothing if not experts at tenaciously doling out recurring ignominy.
Welcome to hell, our newest Laura Goldman, welcome to hell.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Brian Allen” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Laura Goldman: Owning Apple stock is a spiritual experience devoid of logic – February 06, 2008
Investment advisor Laura Goldman puts ‘sell’ on Apple – May 21, 2007
This reeks of pure manipulation. Drive the price down and pick it up after the drop spike for a quick kill. Of course, it could always simply be incompetence.
Yes. Exactly. I wonder what his own full disclosure would look like, given that his manipulative diatribe conveniently leaves out TROUT, POLTRY, BAGL and FLAN.
Lee…
Kee … Isn’t that a Korean surname…. Samsung could at least ask it’s lackeys to be a little more undercover…this is such total nonsense that it is almost sad.
Push AAPL down, buy it up.
And this is legal. Entirely up an up in the trade.
In fact, the higher data rates associated with iPhone4s should be music to the ears of AT&T and Verizon!
Sprint entered into an agreement with Apple that experts like Kee said would be the end of Sprint because the demands of Apple were so high.
The truth is that Sprint WOULD have died without the iPhone. As it is, Sprint gained net subscribers during the December quarter, and the subscribers they gained were higher value subscribers than the average Sprint customer.
Add to that, that the concept that the carrier is the customer, is the business model Apple broke. The carriers used to dictate features, etc to the various manufacturers. Apple said no. This may be one of the factors that prevented Verizon to get the iPhone from the first day.
The REAL customer is the subscriber, by focusing on them Apple upset the apple cart, and sent Motorola, RIMM, Nokia, Sony-Ericsson all scrambling for a new paradigm.
Kee is a FUD spreading idiot.
I totally agree, Greg, carriers as customers–not.
Probably has a point, because Apple is so good from managing the eco-system and getting the lions share of profit to be made I’m sure the carriers, who were previously in that position, are looking doggedly for someone to best Apple. But I agree with you, don’t take your eye off the end customer / user.
Microsoft and Blackberry did this when they became beholden to the enterprise and IT. Building in all the crapware, backwards comparability, and IT tools and ignoring the user is exactly what opened up the consumer market to Apple and Android.
Time to fire Kee
Same old crap. He’s completely bass ackwards.
The end user is Apple’s customer. If an end user wants an iPhone, you think these other businesses are going to turn down the sale? Verizon and Sprint felt what that was like for a few years during the AT&T exclusive. From what I heard Verizon regretted they turned down Apple every day.
And even if the carriers were the customer, why did Sprint make a bet-the-future of the entire company commitment in order to get the iPhone on their network?
Carrier customers, like real human customers – doing anything to get Apple products.
“Most people think Apple’s customers are the end user…”
That’s exactly right. Apple has done so well because Apple knows who the customer is. It’s not the stockholder, and not the telcos – it’s the one who hands over the money for the product and *that’s* who Apple keeps happy. I’ve been harping on that for years now.
Fortunately, Apple is included in those that think their customer is the end user. Go Apple.
Hey Kee! Suck my blankity blank
Oh, Oblivion … what reason have thou shed and vision less so.
Remember the 100 millions to promote Nokia – Microsoft Lumnia? Well, this guy is the first step of that campaign.
Apple has been off the chart with customer satisfaction in every platform.
Apple has been the key innovator for all the categories in electronic devices. What “Apple” is this guy talking about? how much weed is he smoking? Is he talking about “Apple Corps” (the Beatles company) or he juts got a few box from microsoft to say that?
This moron Kee has it absolutely a$$ backwards. Apple’s real customers ARE the end users and that’s why they’ve been so successful for the past several years. The others that keep stumbling and falling (MS, HP, etc) only care about pleasing resellers and almost completely ignore the end users. So go right ahead and sell your AAPL shares Kee, while the rest of us continue to enjoy the ride further up.
Kee- Razy
Apple regularly gets customer satisfaction survey results of around 80% and massively above the industry average. I wonder how highly rated Thomas Kee’s advice might be ?
If third party resellers are unhappy with how Apple is treating them, they don’t have to sell iPhones. All their rivals are trying to get as many as they can get their hands on in order to satisfy demand.
Oddly enough, I don’t see any signs or third party resellers walking away from iPhones and I don’t see any actual evidence offered from Mr Kee either.
You go ahead and sell Mr. Kee.
I’ll keep.
The only thing dumber than these “analyst” who has an agenda are those who actually listen to their recommendations and sell their AAPL
Neither iPhone, iPad, nor Mac is anything remotely close to their full potential, so growth for the next 3 years is nearly assured.
The carriers need iPhone more than the other way around. Witness the decline of TMobile and Sprint because they have missed out the first few years of iPhone. If they hate the margin compression, Apple won’t miss them a bit.
MDN is in collusion with these analyst if it chooses to post such ridiculous garbage!
Please read our mission statement. It may help clear up your misconception.
The best way to expose these analysts is to open the back door of their gated community and let the MDNers pour through.
I love how analyst conjecture and personal opinion is passed off alone as “evidence.”. Like thats the end of the story, moving on. Really only as “evidence” of their complete and utter misread of Apple and utter incompetence. Those who know least report the most dire and web hits headline grabbing most. It oughtta be a crime.
sounds like stock manipulation to me
Wow, if he thinks Verizon is Apple’s customer, he’s a buffoon and should be ignored.
Kee is paid Samsung shill. Pay no attention.
Holy cow, talk about clueless! Is this guy really just channeling Scott Moritz or sumthin’?
Didn’t I read somewhere that Apple gets most of its revenue outside of the USA? Verizon & Sprint don’t encompass the globe. Perhaps this twat should get an atlas out and see if other countries exist.
The comments on “MarketWatch” are about 99% against Kee’s take.
Just read some of the articles… most think he is wrong.
He replied that he is using the “technicals” which indicates that he is using formulas that deal with all kinds of companies like house builders, manure sellers, microsoft, etc. And just because they follow some general rules, he does not understand Apple as a company.
Basic failure of all anal…..ysts. They think Apple sells orange juice and tampons… and make decisions accordingly.
Apple makes insanely great products and has only 5-10 percent of the market at the moment. I am guessing it will eventually grow to up to 35% of computer market and 70% of rest of markets.
Just a thought.
Time to load up again, actually.
Kee’s managed to shave a few bucks off the SP. His pals will be loading up now to sell after Apple announces what Kee understands will be a huge blowout quarter.
… things. Because raining pathetic attacks on him is a waste of time and energy.
1) while he is right that Apple needs to pay attention to those larger “customers”, the individuals are more important.
2) how is it that MSFT is in the vast majority of “tech” mutual funds while AAPL is nowhere to be seen in most? This, while MSFT is slowly circling the drain (losing market cap) and AAPL is continuously growing?
Now back to our regularly scheduled (and much deserved) sh!t st0rm.
In a way Kee is correct. Apple “sells” the phones to the phone companies, who sell them to the end users at a subsidized discount. So in the short run, big sales negatively affect the telco’s short term profit margin.
However what Kee doesn’t understand is that makes the telcos happy,since it locks in a stream of long term profits. So it is correct that Kee has it ass backwards