The worst decline in five months! Apple downgraded by Barclays, warning of cooling iPhone demand.

Apple's stock price took a hit in 2024, with a drop of about 4.5% during Tuesday's midday trading on January 2nd. The decline narrowed to within 4% by the end of the day, resulting in a decrease of approximately 3.6%. This marks the largest single-day drop since August 4th, 2023, and a new closing low since November 9th.

The main culprit behind Apple's sharp decline is Barclays. Analysts led by Tim Long at Barclays downgraded Apple's stock rating from "hold" to "underweight" in their latest report. This is the first time the bank has lowered Apple to this rating since 2019. Additionally, these analysts slightly lowered Apple's target price from $161 to $160, a decrease of about 17% from the previous trading day's closing price on Friday. This suggests that Barclays predicts Apple's stock price will drop by approximately 17% in the next year based on last Friday's price.

According to the Barclays report, 2023 and 2024 will be the years when Apple's stock returns to its average value after two years of outperforming the trend. After a review, the analysts slightly adjusted their expectations for Apple, still anticipating weak sales and product performance, as well as a potential rebound in Mac, iPad, and wearable devices. This review includes the worsening decline in Apple's demand in markets outside of China and continued weakness in developed markets.

Barclays attributes Apple's expected weak product performance to the following factors:

• Barclays expects Apple's performance to continue to be weak until the release of Apple 16 in 2024. The analysts maintain a negative view on the sales and product lineup of Apple 15 and anticipate that there may not be any features or upgrades that would make Apple 16 more attractive.
• Mac and iPad need further recovery to reach pre-COVID-19 levels. Despite being 20% to 30% higher than industry competitors, the combined sales of these two products have not shown significant growth compared to pre-pandemic levels.
• The growth of Apple's services business is slowing down, and regulatory risks are increasing. Barclays predicts that the growth of the services sector in the fiscal years 2024 and 2025 will be around 10% and 8%, respectively, significantly lower than the previous expectation of 20% growth. In 2024, Barclays is expected to make an initial assessment of Google's traffic acquisition costs (TAC), which may lead to further investigations into some app stores.
• Apple's valuation is high, especially after several quarters of weak performance. While Apple's stock performed well overall in 2023, the earnings per share (EPS) for the year decreased. Therefore, the stock's performance was mainly driven by multiple expansion. Barclays believes that these numbers will not increase, and thus, the pressure on the price-to-earnings ratio will continue throughout the new year.
• In the long run, the returns of Apple's ecosystem are diminishing. Barclays believes that over the past decade, Apple's ecosystem has shifted from being Mac-driven to Apple-driven, and the entire system remains very strong. However, Barclays predicts that the impact of new products/services on the ecosystem is relatively small, which will increase the difficulty of future growth in the coming years.

Throughout 2023, Apple's stock price has risen by more than 48%. However, Barclays analysts warn that the combination of sustained weak performance and multiple expansion is not sustainable.