Analysts: Long wait times for Apple’s iPhone 7/Plus encouraging

“The Street’s checking in on Apple’s iPhone 7 today, two weeks after the device went on sale broadly at retail,” Tiernan Ray reports for Barron’s. “”

“Citigroup’s Jim Suva reiterates a Buy rating on Apple shares, and raises his price target to $130 from $120, after raising his iPhone unit shipment estimate for the December-ending fiscal Q1 to 79.4 million from 73 million, boosting his financial estimate for the quarter to $74.4 billion in revenue, 38.7% gross margin, and $3.15 per share in earnings,” Ray reports. “That revenue number is slightly higher than the consensus $74 billion, he notes.”

“Sure, supply of the iPhone is a factor in the current long wait for units, but he thinks demand is also very good at this point,” Ray reports. “Also this morning, BTIG Research’s Walter Piecyk notes this morning long wait times, writing ‘the initial results indicate longer waits for iPhones and are supportive to our thesis that Apple can return to growth in the December quarter.'”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Not bad for Apple’s “boring” iPhone 7 series or, in other words, the best iPhones we’ve ever owned by a significant margin. Our iPhone 6s Plus pales in comparison to our new iPhone 7 Plus units in terms of speed, haptics, and camera quality.



  1. Until Apple releases sales figures, all this speculation is completely meaningless. Nobody knows how all the factors stack up……..

    positive: Apple sales should be improved by Samsung’s catastrophes
    positive: Apple’s retail network continues to grow and therefore has more outlets to increase sales in more countries
    positive: online distribution of cell phones is now possible without requiring setup in a store
    positive: Apple is finally shipping in mass to China and emerging markets

    negative: Apple’s shipping has been slowed by the Hanjin Shipping bankruptcy
    negative: Jet black is apparently hard to manufacture
    negative: loss of headphones really is a concern for some people, they could buy older less profitable model iPhones
    negative: Cook has a horrible track record of meeting initial pent-up demand of anything
    negative: more complex means more bugs plague Apple. the BMW bluetooth fiasco, etc are all reasons for buyers to wait for version x.1 for Apple wares just like every other company. With software and definitely with iCloud, Apple is no longer trouble-free experience (not that anything is perfect, but the stakes are higher now)

    1. I think it’s Apple in general who has a difficult track record of meeting initial pent-up demand of almost anything. (When has that been different for any company with massive demand for a product? Most companies don’t make products as desirable as Apple’s so demand for those products is manageable. Even still companies like Tesla’s have been months and years behind in delivering cars people want.)

      Also I do not think demand for the iPhone was “pent-up” because of all the pre-introduction negative publicity, only after it was introduced did people get hot and bothered. Anyway a nice problem to have. This go around I expect the initial logjam will clear in a month or two.

  2. I don’t know who to believe about Apple’s iPhone sales. Many analysts have conflicting views about the same topic. I just know that although Apple and Amazon have raised price targets only Amazon’s share price is steadily climbing. Apple’s share price constantly cycles up and down. There is absolutely no bad news for Amazon’s outlook while Apple outlook gets a constant stream of bad news. It’s almost a guarantee Amazon will reach $900 a share before Apple reaches a steady $115 a share. Apple is still a laggard stock and Tim Cook isn’t helping.

    1. Amazon deserves its stock increases as it is huge, growing extremely fast, and creating a set of businesses whose margin are becoming more and more in control (while still being sacrificed for growth).

      But back to Apple. The problem for large investors of other people’s money, is that Apple is secretive of future developments.

      The result means that as long as Apple is both secretive and successful, its stock will be undervalued but offer better returns over the long run, than other stocks.

      In other words, as long as you think they can keep improving their products at a fair clip, buy Apple.

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