Apple’s in a Slump… And Wall Street’s Not Sticking Around for Extra Innings

We had a men’s softball game last night. And for some reason, our best hitters were cold as ice. Couldn’t buy a base hit if they paid off the pitcher. But somehow… some way… we scratched together enough runs, played solid defense, and squeaked out a win. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t dominant. But it got the job done. That’s basically been Apple for the last decade.

Even when the iPhone hype cooled down… even when everyone said “innovation is dead” or “Tim Cook is just a spreadsheet in human form,” Apple still found a way to win. They’d string together a Services beat here, a new MacBook color there, sprinkle in a little buyback magic… and boom, $3 trillion market cap. But this year feels different.

Needham just became the latest firm to downgrade Apple… cutting it from “Buy” to “Hold” and deleting their $225 price target like it never existed. Laura Martin, the analyst behind the move, basically said: Hey, we love you guys, but your growth is slowing, your AI game is nonexistent, and you're looking a little pricey for what you’re actually delivering.

In other words: we don’t see a catalyst, and your forward P/E of 26x makes us nervous… especially when that’s 50% above your 10-year average and your iPhone upgrade cycle is flatter than a cornfield in Illinois. This comes as Apple stock is down nearly 16% this year. To go back to my softball metaphor, that’s worse than a bad inning. That’s a full-blown slump… the worst among the entire Magnificent Seven. Yes, even worse than Zuck’s metaverse fever dream.

Everyone and their dog is going all-in on AI. Nvidia is out here selling GPUs like they’re hotdogs at the concession stand. Microsoft practically owns OpenAI. And Meta is cramming chatbots into every app like it’s 2012 again. As for Apple? Well… they might mention AI at WWDC next week.

While the rest of Big Tech is building the next generation of smart everything, Apple’s been acting like the quiet kid in the back of the classroom… won’t raise their hand, but swears they’ve done the homework. On the other hand, OpenAI just brought in Jony Ive, Apple’s former design god, to help design AI-first devices. If that’s not a “we took the kids” divorce move, I don’t know what is. Needham even warned that these new AI-driven devices could make iPhones feel like a VHS tape in the Netflix era. A pretty big claim, but not totally off base.

Trump wants iPhones made in West Virginia. Which… sure. Let’s ignore the fact that Apple’s supply chain is so complex it makes a NASA mission look like 1st grade math homework. The EU, on the other hand, is demanding Apple open up iMessage to outsiders… including giving Zuckerberg access to your private messages. Because that’s the guy you want reading your “u up?” texts. The irony is that Apple has built its entire brand on not collecting your data. And now they’re getting punished for it.

Let’s not get dramatic… Apple still pulled in $90B last quarter. They still have more cash than most countries. And yes, there are still bulls out there with $250+ price targets, hoping AI announcements at WWDC will remind everyone who’s boss. But even Wall Street’s losing a bit of faith. Fewer than 60% of analysts tracked by Bloomberg now rate it a “Buy”... a far cry from Microsoft, Amazon, or Nvidia, who are sitting near 90% approval.

Apple’s still in the game. But unlike my softball team last night, where role players stepped up and defense carried us to a dub, Apple’s star players aren’t producing, and no one’s stepping up to fill the gap. They used to win even when they shouldn’t. Now, they’re starting to lose even when it feels like they should win. And that’s a scary shift.

PS: Nobody knows what’s going on right now. Definitely not Jim Cramer. Not your buddy who suddenly became a macro expert after watching two TikToks. Not even the Wall Street suits who pretend they’ve got it all figured out.

One minute, AI stocks are mooning. The next, a random shipping company with five employees in Delaware is up 300% by noon. It’s chaos. And trying to make sense of it with old-school strategies is like bringing a highlighter to a gunfight.

But here’s what we do know: Underneath the confusion, there’s real opportunity… especially in small caps where a single insider buy or short squeeze setup can ignite a triple digit move in minutes. And while the masses chase headlines, we’re tracking the signals before they show up on Reddit.

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Stock.News has positions in Apple, Meta, Netflix, Amazon, and Microsoft.