Word that Apple may not release the iPhone 5 as early as expected prompted some observers to talk of a “delay.” Naturally, Wall Street’s sensitive rumor tripwire went into action, the result the start of analysts downgrading estimates for the iPhone.
Piper Jeffries’ Peter Misek Wednesday morning shaved four percent from his fiscal year 2011 revenue projection, telling investors he expects the Cupertino, Calif. company to rake in $103 billion, rather than his previously estimated $106.9 billion. The fiscal year ends September. More dramatic is the analyst’s double-digit refiguring of iPhone shipments.
Misek sliced 8 percent from his fiscal year iPhone shipments to 65.7 million units, down from his previous 71.7 million estimate. This translates to a 15 percent cut for the June and September financial quarters.
Additionally, the analyst now believes iPhone shipments for fiscal 2012 will be down 6 percent to 89.1 million units, lower than Misek’s 94.9 million units previously forecast.
Monday word came that Apple would not release the iPhone at the upcoming developer’s conference set for June. Traditionally, Apple unveils a new iPhone during this period. However, in announcing this year’s WWDC, Apple said the conference would be a preview of “the future of iOS and Mac OS X.” Instead, Apple likely will introduce its cloud-based data locker, as well as the updated iOS.
Will we see more analysts view the out-of-sync product announcements as a sign of a slowdown for Apple and push the iPhone maker to rush the iPhone 5 release? Will second quarter numbers expected in April reassure the market? Will consumers ignore Wall Street’s worries? Tune in for the next exciting chapter of As the iPhone Turns.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
14 responses to “Wall Street Trims Apple Estimates on iPhone 5 ‘Delays’”
1. Just because they aren’t announcing it at WWDC doesn’t mean they can’t at its own event/live streamed announcement
2. Apple will release it when it is ready. Even if that means no new iphone this year. There’s logic to it. What could they do to improve it. A little bit faster processor, a little bit better camera, NFC that isn’t ready for primetime, LTE that isn’t ready for primetime. It almost seems like it is better to skip a year. The analysts act like Apple swore on a stack of bibles and Job’s new liver to always release a new iphone every year, no later than July and to always announce it at WWDC. None of which is true
Apple can’t afford to do nothing this year. They are rapidly losing ground on Android and the only way to get it back would be to refresh their almost 1 year old hardware. My 3GS contract is up at the end of June/early July, and I’ll be looking to get a new phone. I don’t want a phone that is a year old at that point. Even if it’s just a “4gs” with A5 processor and added storage. It’s time for Apple to up the storage limit. They’re starting to lag behind with Android phones being able to have “up to 48GB’s of storage”. It’s time for a 32GB and 64GB iPhone. We can’t rely on cloud storage for our media with the carriers low tiered data plans.
And correct me if I’m wrong, but when has Apple come out and said..”Hey, WWDC is coming up June 6th. Please come for software announcements and a new iPhone announcement.”? Just because they didn’t specifically say there would be a new iPhone doesn’t mean there won’t be one. It’s hard to believe what these analysts are saying….for a few years before the Verizon iPhone was available, all I read was that “sources close to Apple or Verizon say it’l be soon”.
I just won’t believe anything until June 6th hits and Steve Jobs takes the stage. At that point, I’ll be hoping for a new iPhone. And if there isn’t one….I guess I’ll be getting an iPhone 4 and hope they at least drop the price on it.
I know I am not alone in this situation of waiting to make the power switch to the reliable Verizon Network the latest iPhone5 or 4X. Its hard enough to wait until June but if Apple postpones until the Fall or holiday shopping cycles, then I may just be forced to go Verizon’s Thunderbolt. I need to get off AT&T and will not settle for an iPhone 4.
They’re not ‘doing nothing’ this year. Apple has a lot planned for the fall, including ios5 and and a potentially significantly updated iphone 5. And there’s talk of a pretty revolutionary integration to be announced for ios and mac osx in June. Meanwhile, Apple still can’t make enough iphone 4’s to keep up with demand. I think they’ll be survive till September.
That was more of a response to lucascott who said “Apple will release it when it is ready. Even if that means no new iphone this year.” and “It almost seems like it is better to skip a year.”. I still don’t think they should wait it out until September, but then again, I’m kinda biased considering my contract with AT&T is up and expect to get the latest and greatest iPhone, not last years latest and greatest iPhone.
wall street can eat my shorts. somebody already mentioned the apple pipe is phat with a ‘ph’. there is plenty happening, regardless of whether the jesus phone launches at the same time every year. if you wanna strike fear into investors, why not focus on the ridiculous runs priceline (pcln) and netflix (nflx) have been on. utterly ridiculous to watch them fly to the moon and back. the apple bank is still depositing hordes of money and enjoying insane levels of popularity / satisfaction. everyone must realize that when dealing with the market analysts, they are in it to make a buck… duh. my honest opinion is that apple wants to release an lte iphone 5, and maybe even throw in nfc, but once again, those technologies aren’t quite there yet. toss those two additions on top of the sleek design (which i don’t expect to be a radical departure from v4… except possibly thinner and maybe a few aesthetic differences), and you have another barn burning device on your hands. let things play out, the company hasn’t achieved it’s status by not knowing what it needs to do. android is good, but remember, it’s gameplan is brute force market saturation (via running on as many devices as possible), and this will never be the apple way. so continue to enjoy your shiny itoys, and don’t trip over your own fears. $0.02
I so agree with you Dave. I don’t want last year’s phone either. And I don’t understand where these people are getting their information. Apple never came out and “officially” said there would be no new iphone this year. Last year the the iphone 4 leaked before the launched so it was such a big supprise when Apple officially announced it. It’s not surpising that Apple would be playing the next gen iphone close to the chest this year.