Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc., during the first day of in-store sales for the latest Apple products at the Apple Fifth Avenue store in New York, US, on Friday, September 20, 2024.
Victor J. Blue | Bloomberg | Getty Images
apple The stock closed down 4% on Thursday, its worst day since August 5, after several reports of lackluster iPhone sales in China.
The iPhone maker's stock price is down nearly 12% from its recent highs in December, the worst performer among the seven largest technology stocks so far in 2025.
The slide follows a report released Thursday from Canalys, a market research firm, which indicated that Apple has fallen to third place in terms of smartphones sold in China in 2024, behind local manufacturers Vivo and Huawei.
Apple shipped 15% of the 284 million phones sold in China last year, according to the report, but that was down 17% year over year. Meanwhile, Vivo and Huawei saw strong growth.
TSMC, Apple's main supplier, on Thursday announced a first-quarter smartphone sales forecast that indicates a sequential decline of about 6%. TSMC, which makes the chips used at the heart of Apple devices, attributed the decline to seasonality. TSMC said artificial intelligence chips accounted for more than half of its revenue in the fourth quarter, replacing smartphones, which were its largest business.
Apple senior supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo on Monday books He expects iPhone shipments to decline by 6% year-on-year in the first half of 2025, with most of the decline occurring in the second quarter. Kuo wrote that he believes Apple Intelligence, the company's artificial intelligence system that is not yet available in China, is not boosting demand for the iPhone.
“There is no evidence that Apple Intelligence can benefit from device replacement cycles or services businesses,” Kuo wrote.
Apple reports December quarter results on January 30.
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