Apple May Not Break $199 Again

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Feb 17, 7:36AM EST

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Apple May Not Break $199 Again — © Mario Tama / Getty Images News via Getty Images

Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL | AAPL Price Prediction) share price hit $199.62 on December 11 last year. The price started relentlessly from $59 in November 2019. It was easy money for people who bought the stock then or as it rose over the four years—those easy money days started to end late last summer. It may be a coincidence, but the iPhone 15 was launched on September 12, 2023. Since then, anxiety about its success, particularly in China, has weighed on its share price. Warren Buffett recently sold Apple shares.

Apple’s management has tried to argue that its hardware business is less and less critical to its financials. There is some strength to that position. Apple’s revenue rose only 2% in the most recent quarter to $119.6 billion. EPS was up 16% to $2.18. CEO Tim Cook said Apple’s active installed base topped 2.2 billion. It is from this installed base that Apple’s quick-growing Services business gets its growth. In the quarter, Services revenue rose 11% to $23.1 billion.

iPhone revenue for the quarter rose 6% to $69.7 billion, which showed the iPhone 15 was not a blistering success. And revenue from Mac and Wearables retreated. That means two of Apple’s five divisions retreated. The iPhone could not carry enough revenue weight, so Apple’s hardware growth was at least reasonable.

China was a huge disappointment. Revenue in the most recent quarter dropped from $23.9 billion in the year-ago quarter to $20.8 billion. Apple calls the region “Greater China”. Analysts warned early this year that Apple’s market share might be slipping. Apple needs China to be a strong region. It tops the list of nations based on smartphone sales—over 900 million Chinese own one.

Optimists about Apple’s future would like to see its share break above $200, but That may never happen.

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.