In his first public appearance since Apple (AAPL) announced its first-ever year-over-year decline in iPhone sales, Apple CEO Tim Cook defended the tech giant’s performance and called Wall Street’s response a “huge overreaction.”
“We had an incredible quarter by absolute standards,” Cook told CNBC’s Jim Cramer on the Mad Money program, adding that “$10 billion [in Q1 profits] is more than any other company, so it was a pretty good quarter but not up to the Street’s expectations clearly. What we’re seeing is that people are upgrading at a lower rate than they did last year, but still higher than the year before. But the most important thing is that customers love our products and they are using them and the satisfaction has never been higher and the loyalty rates have never been higher. And that is what is really important for us. That’s the most important thing for the long term of Apple.”
When asked about the company’s performance in China, Cook said he is still confident in prospects for the Mainland’s market, noting that over the last two years Apple has grown 70% in China. Apple’s China sales in Q116 were down 11% from the same quarter a year ago.
Last week, billionaire investor Carl Icahn said he dumped all of his 45.8 million shares of AAPL stock out of concern about the company’s ability to navigate the Chinese market.
“I worry a tsunami could hit it,” Icahn told CNBC.
Apple’s stock fell 2% after Icahn revealed the sale. It’s down 15% so far this month. AAPL has lost more than $79 billion in market cap over the past eight sessions.
Apple began trading this morning at $93.87, 0.25% higher from the prior days close of $93.64.
Leave a Reply