Re: Record profits yet Wall St says No
"Donning my MBA tinfoil hat"
If you are an MBA then you should be aware Apple are sitting on what is probably the largest corporate cash pile in history and have no need to raise money from the stock market and so fluctuations in share price are of far less significance to them than for most other public listed companies. Of course they shouldn't be complacent and I understand the influence of share price can have an insidious effect even on cash rich companies, but there is no question over any of Apple's senior management team or strategy. They are very steady hands, so on that score there is no reason for alarm bells or for going private.
"I have to wonder if some of those forecasts were oiled by outside interests that could gain from short selling on Apple Stock. The SEC should be looking into this."
Quite possible, I would put no depth of failure in integrity beyond Wall Street money men, but more likely I think that two very important factors in a multi-variable equation have gone the wrong way, the first, falling short of analyst predictions, most of us normal people don't set much store by - but Wall Street money men do - the second in conjunction with the fears produced by the first has, I suspect, had a multiplier effect; that China's economy has deteriorated.
What the analysts fear has been demonstrated is that a luxury high priced good is more susceptible to worsening economic conditions in China than they had hoped. That might sound obvious to most people, but actually historically consumer behaviour isn't so intuitive. In established markets luxury good sales tend to hold up better than most would think when the economy slows. So demonstration that that hasn't occurred in this case (or even the suspicion it is the reason) means there is likely to have been an adjustment based on the understanding in the immediate future China's economy will be going the wrong way and Apple goods in China won't be quite the safe harbour they were hoping.