Ming-Chi Kuo Lowers iPhone XR Shipment Estimates By 30% Due To The Trade War, High Price, And Competition

Ming-Chi Kuo's latest research note apparently cutting his shipment estimates for the iPhone XR down to 70 million units, which previously was 100 million. He lists several factors such as the ongoing trade war with China, users' expectation for a affordable device, as well as competition from other smartphone brand like Huawei, he believes that the decline will be offset by higher demand for iPhone XS.

We have reduced our iPhone XR shipment estimation from 100mn units to 70mn during the new product lifecycle (4Q18–3Q19) for the following reasons: 1) Negative impacts on consumer confidence from the trade war, especially in the Chinese market, 2) expectations from more users for more affordable XR or the dual-camera and narrower bezel design to be provided at the current price level, and 3) competition from Huawei's Mate 20 series. We have reduced our XR shipment estimations for 4Q18, 1Q19, and 2Q19 by 30–35%, 25–30%, and 25–30% to 30–35, 20–25, and 10–15mn units, respectively.

The analyst also reducing his overall iPhone shipment forecasts by 15–20 percent for the first quarter of 2019. Kuo also lowered his first-quarter estimate to only 47–52 million from a previous range of 55–60 million. Since Apple has stopped reporting iPhone sales, it will be tough to find out that how many they sold and made how much money from it.

Impacted by the news, Apple's stock today isn't pretty, as matter of fact, the stock dropped 4% as of right now, its market cap also went to from 1.05 trillion a couple weeks ago to $930 billion at the current time.