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  • Toni +
  • 32 Comments

  Oct 05 07:03 AM
  "The Consumer Spending Slowdown Catches Apple"
  
  And the proof of that is ?

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  • papita
  • 41 Comments

  Oct 05 07:17 AM
  First of all, as an investor, remember that word, I try to focus on longer than the next 90 days. Second, I was in the local Apple store yesterday. The mall was jammed and the Apple store was even more jammed. They were waiting in line.

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  • debtfree
  • 9 Comments

  Oct 05 08:37 AM
  I find this article has NO PROOF of the title. First the charts are missing many data points where is June 08, July 07.... I have to agree with papita, the number of users that were in the mall last weekend in the Apple store was incredible and they were buying computers!! Also consider the back to school effect, this last quarter is traditionally high and Oct should have a lull in spending (where is october in the data charts?) as a normal seasonal effect.

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  • Roger Knights
  • 142 Comments

  Oct 05 09:29 AM
  "in both our July and August surveys ... the Mac halo effect caused by the release of the 3G iPhone was still in effect."
  "Apple has a considerable visibility problem."
  The solution to the puzzled-over "product transition" announced in June appears to be something that will create a great halo effect for Apple when it is announced Oct. 14. A credible-seeming rumor from a source with a good track record describes it as a US-based, environmentally friendly, advanced manufacturing process that will produce slicker hardware. It's already (within 12 hours) generating lots of buzz. Here's the link:
  www.9to5mac.com/macboo...

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  • mollytjm
  • 275 Comments

  Oct 05 11:32 AM
  Apple is quite capable of constant innovation at a level that inspires new and more sales. that will continue. the analysis in this article only works if Apple products stay the same. that won't happen. of course, the market is a mess and going to get a lot worse as a million people lose their jobs, but Apple already has dropped some prices because it's also innovative about manufacturing (see above article)...and...at the levels their products are selling, they can command lower prices for parts and production and, at no cost to them, pass those lower prices on to consumers. Apple isn't trying to keep its head above water like other pc makers. it can afford to spend $ on innovation. That will make apple a continuing terrific company.
  p.s. the king of prussia mall store is also doing a booming business.

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  • KenC
  • 137 Comments

  Oct 05 03:02 PM
  Paul, I find your surveys interesting; however, I think many are reading far too much into the numbers. Here are some problems I see in what you have posted:
  
  1) The X-axis is NOT consistent. In '06 you use Jan, Mar, Jun and Sep; in '07, you use Jan, Mar, Jun, Aug, and Nov. Then in '08, you use Jan, Feb, May, Aug, and September. When people look at the chart, they immediately assume you are measuring quarterly, but if you look carefully, you see odd intervals, some being as soon as monthly. This leads to a chart that isn't correct, timewise.
  
  2) Where is the correlation measure between the two charts, Purchasing Past 90 days, and Purchasing Next 90 days? As a leading and lagging indicator, the measures do not seem to correlate very well. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that the Dates upon which the surveys are taken are not separated by 90 day increments. It's just hard to draw quick conclusions from graphical data, when the graphical data is not presented in its most obvious manner. Like point 1, why is the time period between surveys varying? Or, why is the X-axis not reflective of these differing time intervals? Shouldn't you use graphing software that accurately reflects these x-axis intervals?
  
  3) Since you are asking for 90 days worth of purchasing intent or behavior, can't you parse out the actual 30 day behavior, if you doing surveys every 30 days? I mean, look at the Sept 08 purchasing past 90 day number of 17% for desktops. This would indicate that sales for June might be around 15%, since July and Aug lagging indicators are both at 19%, BUT if Aug 08 is 19%, and May is 16% then June looks unlikely to be around 15%. In other words, the survey's accuracy in actual purchasing behavior seems not to add up.
  
  4) Further looking at your chart, the decline in September may be seasonal, but we can't tell, since the only period measured where you show both August and September is this year. We can't see what happened in 07 or 06. There may have been like declines, attributable to the bump from BTS, back-to-school, sales peaking in August. Look at Sept 06, it shows a decline from June 06 in laptops.
  
  5) In regards to the last chart on total CE spending, your survey seems to show, that in Sept 06 and Sept 07, people really don't know what their Xmas shopping behavior will be, because by November, the increase is quite large.
  
  6) Looking further at your chart on CE spending, while the trend is clearly down, if CE spending is going down, it should have been going down since February of 08, since the split in sentiment was already down 14% points. By August this negative sentiment had hardly changed to 19%. Where's the correlation to CE spending since February?
  
  The bottom line, is that the surveys, while worrisome, could be far more enlightening, if some of the outlined problems, could be fixed. A more consistent timeline, showing actual intervals, not consistently spaced intervals would go a long way to making the charts more informative. The way the X-axis is now is really bad use of stats.

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  • jegan ;-)
  • 688 Comments

  Oct 05 08:19 PM
  I'm no Apple fanatic, but I do have $12K of stock and some April 09 Calls. There never seems to be a middle ground in Apple articles. Either, or stock holdings will ascend to the right side of God, or, conversely, we'll be stoking the fires of Hell with them. My guess is that it really depends upon Dubya's posse. They either get credit back on track and inspire confidence, or they don't . And I mean soon. The failure of our seated CEO to rally his troops to push his bill through Congress cost the equity market 777 points. This is not a good indicator and we still have a ways to go before we hit the magic 10,000 DOW mark. If they do, we may actually have an OK Christmas and I'd expect AAPL to rally a bit. If they don't and we keep running up the unemployment numbers, businesses can't get credit and foreign markets are doing anything either, then I expect AAPL to tank some more. Time for a double shot of scotch!!!
  
  jegan ;-)

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  • brewer
  • 390 Comments

  Oct 06 01:12 AM
  I do surveys for a living, and I really don't think the downturn you are seeing here is statistically significant. It may appear so if you have a very large N, but THINK for a minute what you are saying here. This rate of sales is MUCH higher than Apple's purported marketshare. Apple's breakout is just getting started. Ninety days is a very short horizon.
  
  Finally, why not present some data from Dell, HP, etc...? Is it that it would make the Apple numbers look fantastic? I think so, I've seen them.

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  • jocca
  • 8 Comments

  Oct 06 01:28 AM
  There are surveys everywhere showing that demand for electronics will be affected by the slow down in the economy. Have any analysts bothered to check out the Apple stores lately? The one in Vancouver and in Sacramento are jammed with people even on week days. My little finger is telling me that Apple will do better than most analysts think.

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  • yet another steve
  • 19 Comments

  Oct 06 04:10 AM
  Visibility problem? Absolutely. But it's already in the stock.
  
  Technically, the stock has not found a bottom.
  
  But it certainly seems like there is more upside risk than downside risk at an enterprise value of just $72/share.
  
  And Apple buyers tend to simply delay purchases, not switch brands. Sooo.... the franchise is just as strong whenever consumer spending recovers.
  
  A big slowdown in consumer electronic spending could also give Apple some help with margins. Which equals some serious operating flexibility. And while we're all just guessing what their numbers are, they certainly know.
  
  If the world doesn't end, Apple is well positioned to emerge even stronger. But there's no limit to how much a stock can overshoot--upside or downside.
  
  If the world does end, none of this will matter...

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