Apple wants you to have two takeaways from this letter:
1) China
2) iPhone (particularly in China)
But there’s a bunch of other things buried in there... apple.com/newsroom/2019/…
1) China
2) iPhone (particularly in China)
But there’s a bunch of other things buried in there... apple.com/newsroom/2019/…
First, when is the last time Apple had to revise estimates? I can’t recall. After years of sandbagging, they’ve gotten more realistic in recent years. But they keep saying in the letter that they knew it would be a challenging quarter, but still missed badly. Not good.
Second, again they try to chalk it all up to China, but it’s clear (albeit buried) that they’re having larger iPhone growth issues all over. This is the law of large numbers at work and was always inevitable. And it’s a big problem (relatively) going forward.
Third, did you hear Tim Cook say “services”? Because I did about 50 times. While growth there is awesome, the problem is that it’s still not the iPhone business (nothing is), which is ultimately what matters for the business and will for a loooonnng time. 500ish.com/the-microsoft-…
Fourth, did you catch the bit about trying to get more customers paying for and upgrading iPhones on a regular basis? This is “Apple Prime”. And it is coming. And given the above, I’d bet on sooner rather than later. 500ish.com/apple-prime-an…
Fifth, I am bullish on the “Apple Prime” concept because the company has such loyal users (and great, unique products) but this will not be an easy strategy to execute upon. 500ish.com/the-1-500-ipho…
Lastly, don’t sleep on Apple Pay. The car is too far away. The glasses won’t be big enough any time soon (again, relative to iPhone). So Apple can either try to become an oil company, or a bank... 🍎💰 500ish.com/apple-the-oil-…
