Apple Stock Could Be Beaten Down by Federal Lawsuit

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Mar 21, 6:40AM EDT

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Apple Stock Could Be Beaten Down by Federal Lawsuit — © Eric Thayer / Getty Images News via Getty Images

The U.S. Department of Justice will sue Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL | AAPL Price Prediction) for anti-competitive practices. The suit will say that Apple has blocked several competitors from using its hardware and software to promote their productions. And it will have an impact on Apple stock.

According to Bloomberg, “The coming case will mark the third time that the Justice Department has sued Apple for antitrust violations in the past 14 years, but it is the first case accusing the iPhone maker of illegally maintaining its dominant position.” The European Union also just fined Apple approximately $3 billion for anti-competitive behavior against companies that are rivals to its streaming business.

Government action is not Apple’s only problem. Meta, Microsoft, X, and Match Group have taken the iPhone maker to court because it has not honored a deal to open Apple’s app store to their products. According to CNN, “The filing accuses Apple of willfully circumventing the spirit of the original order, which was designed to unlock competition by forcing Apple to let app makers communicate with their users about deals and promotions in specific ways.”

Add these headwinds to what appear to be slow iPhone sales in China and worries that the company lags competition in delivering AI to customers, and Apple stock may be under pressure for months, if not longer. (Here are five reasons to avoid Apple products today.)

The company’s turnaround options have narrowed quickly. Apple stock reflects that, as it is down 7% this year, while the S&P 500 is 10% higher. The only possibility of a Wall Street change in sentiment is probably a successful launch of the iPhone 16, and that does not happen until September.

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.