Apple shares edged higher in early Thursday trading, paring a move into correction territory for the world's second-largest tech stock, after Goldman Sachs analysts issued a price-target downgrade ahead of the tech giant's December-quarter earnings report next week.
Apple (AAPL) shares have fallen around 13.6% since their Boxing Day peak, shedding more than $600 billion in market value and losing its place as the world's biggest company to Nvidia (NVDA) . The market move came amid concern tied to muted iPhone demand and the impact of its Apple Intelligence AI rollout.
Stiffer competition for smartphones sales in China, a key Apple market, is also weighing on the group. Data last week indicated that local rivals Huawei and Vivo secured first and second place in overall handset-market share in the world's second-largest economy last year.
International Data, which published its closely watched report on global handset sales earlier this month, said Apple's fourth-quarter deliveries fell 4.1% from the year-earlier period to around 76.9 million units.
Apple held onto its title of the world's biggest smartphone seller, however, with an estimated 18.7% share of the global market, according to IDC data, just ahead of Samsung's 18% tally.
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Goldman Sachs analyst Michael Ng says his forecast for Apple iPhone shipments over the three months ended in December, the group's fiscal first quarter, is largely in line with IDC data. But he says that will be "more than offset by 5% year-over-year iPhone [average selling price] growth."
Apple services revenue in focus
Ng expects iPhone sales rose 1% from the year-ago period, which tallied $69.7 billion, and estimates that overall group revenue advanced just under 4% to $124.2 billion.
"Services growth should continue to compound at double digits, with App Store spending expected to grow 15% and ample runway for further adoption of Apple's services," Ng said.
In a note published Thursday, Ng lowered his price target by $6 to $280 a share. But he maintained his buy rating on Apple stock despite it being on pace for its worst monthly performance since December 2022.
"While competition has intensified within the Chinese smartphone market, we're encouraged by the potential for accelerating iPhone growth in [the next fiscal year] driven by new product innovation for iPhone 17/18 and the continued rollout of Apple Intelligence to new markets with a more robust feature set," Ng said.
Related: Analyst revisits Apple stock price target ahead of Q1 earnings update
"We anticipate market sentiment to improve midyear, which is a seasonally strong period for the stock, as concerns about Apple Intelligence's limited impact on iPhone demand and competition in China are replaced by optimism over the new slate of Apple Intelligence features revealed at WWDC 2025, the launch of new Mac, iPad and iPhone SE products in spring 2025, and potential new features for the iPhone 17/18 in fall 2025/26," Ng and his team wrote.
Apple correction slump 'way overdone'
In a separate note published late Wednesday, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives also weighed in on Apple's recent slump, calling the "panic and bear frenzy" around the stock "way overdone."
Ives, who reiterated his $325 price target on Apple stock ahead of next week's earnings, said the Apple Intelligence rollout will be "the start of a massive growth renaissance at Apple and that bull thesis remains intact as we see ~20% of the world's population ultimately accessing AI through an Apple device over the coming years."
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"Apple Intelligence is the foundation that developers will build hundreds of apps around, and that will translate into billions of incremental services growth for Cupertino over the coming years," Ives said.
"What the bears continue to miss on Apple is its golden installed base of 1.5 billion iPhones and 2.3 billion iOS devices is unmatched and will create a new AI-driven growth story that [Wall] Street is not factoring into the stock," he added.
Apple shares were marked 0.62% higher in early Thursday trading to change hands at $225.03.
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