Apple is tanking and their share values is falling with their shares falling below a critical psychological threshold last night due in part to poor sales in China, record fines by the EU and question marks about their latest VR product which appears to be a failure.
Apple is facing a mountain of issues and like Alan Joyce did at Qantas the Companies current CEO Tim Cook is setting himself up to retire, with his pockets lined with hundreds of millions of dollars.
His current net worth is $3.2 billion with more to come when he retires.
Apple is well known for stealing other people’s technology, currently they are facing regulatory scrutiny of its App Store in several Countries including Australia, then there are the declining sales in China with the iPhone company selling 24% fewer iPhones in China, the world’s second-biggest economy, in the first six weeks of 2024 than a year earlier, according to Counterpoint Research.
There are also investor concerns over its growth prospects with the Company failing to delivery any really new breakthrough products since the death of Steve Jobs ten years ago.
Now their fourth-quarter outlook has raised concerns due to tepid demand for its handsets and other gadgets and the fact that their $3.2 billion dollar fine by the EU after Spotify lodged a complaint about their Apple Store practises.
For years, the two companies have been at war as the streaming service lured users away from Apple’s iTunes and accused the tech giant of exploiting its dominance to stifle innovation.
In their long-running conflict, each has made incursions into the other’s territory. When Apple launched its own streaming service, Apple Music, in 2015, Spotify claimed Apple was able to undercut the platform’s prices because Apple didn’t have to pay the same App Store fees as rivals.
In 2019, Spotify rolled out several high-profile shows, that challenged Apple.
This week their shares, failed to hold at US $180 with the share now trading at US$170 down over 6% during the past five days.
The share could hit $165.67, according to Todd Sohn, managing director of ETF and technical strategy at Strategas Securities.
“Apple is one of the most influential stocks so it may see a bounce from here in the short run after being oversold,” Sohn said.
“But traders may still look to fade it at $180 because its trend has deteriorated so much.”
Since December Apple shares have fallen nearly 12% erasing more than UA$460 billion in market value.
That’s cost Apple its crown as the most valuable US company to Microsoft claim Bloomberg.
