discountopinion
I have to say that most Equities analysts talk their own book.
I.e. if their most profitable clients are looking to load up on AAPL then they will put out cautionary notes to the public about AAPL to allow their clients to buy into depressed demand and thus secure lower average per share prices. Reverse behaviour if looking to offload shares in bulk then talk up the stock to sell into strong demand to get as much for the shares as possible.
Looking objectively at AAPL and unit sales for a minute. Yes handset sales are somewhat threatened as people stretch their upgrade cycles longer and longer. This is somewhat offset with building momentum in new markets like India and Indonesia with huge populations, rapidly growing affluence and low current base for Apple.
Overall selling devices may be less of the story for AAPL in the next few years depending on how some pivotal rulings may or may not change the landscape. This is where one should keep one's eye as services have about 2x gross margin compared to devices and if continuing uninterrupted will soon be 50% of overall gross margin contribution.
Cutting AAPL targets due to handset concerns is quite dumb. Being somewhat concerned with seismic shifts in the services revenue is a better thing to be focused on and caution is needed here.
AAPL needs to better articulate their story of how they will prosper in a world with multiple app stores, competition of in-app payments, search engine placement competition or bans. I.e. what is the growth model with minimal control of the eco-system vs. strong control as it is now.
Personally I think Apple has a bright future ahead of itself as most customers will remain loyal to the brand and the service ecosystem. It is an aspirational product and ecosystem in most countries and as a comparison LMVH, Hermes and others are doing exceedingly well despite there being a mee-too universe of copycats. On the other hand Hermes does not stop the wearer from having Zara trousers together with a silk scarf. Apple currently limits the customer from mixing and matching devices and services with others for the most part.
