- AAPL stock falls nearly 4% Friday on global equity sell-off.
- Jackson Hole hawkish tilt behind sell-off.
- Apple sends out invites for an event on September 7.
Apple (AAPL) stock fell sharply on Friday in line with a global rout in equities. The strongly worded hawkish missive from Fed Chair Powell did the trick and sent equity markets into a risk-off tailspin. Not just equity markets, but all risk assets took a hit as the Nasdaq was the worst performer. Now over the weekend Bitcoin cracked below $20,000.
Apple stock news
Some conflicting positive and negative news for Apple has appeared over the past few sessions. Susquehanna was quite bullish last week in estimating iPhone 13 production would rise to 100 million from a previous 88 million. Overall Susquehanna looks for about an 8% sales growth versus last year for the iPhone. Meanwhile, Politico reported late last week that the DOJ is in the early stages of making an antitrust complaint against Apple and could bring a lawsuit as early as this year.
Finally, September 7 looks like the launch date for the new iPhone 14. Reports claim Apple has sent out media invitations to an event on September 7, which it is widely assumed will be the product launch announcement.
Apple stock forecast
Equity markets look likely to be in for a tough Autumn after Powell carefully scripted the narrative on Friday. Remember, he had most of the summer to plan out what he wanted to say. So he knew the importance of citing Vockler, and he knew what he wanted to achieve when he used words like “pain” and “below trend growth”. The plan was well thought out. He wants equity markets lower to hit demand and so bring inflation down. Whatever Apple does may struggle to overcome such a challenging macro backdrop.
Apple does remain above its 200-day moving average but has failed at the trend line and to test previous highs above $179. First, we have a failure, but we need confirmation of a bearish trend now. That will come with a break of the 200-day moving average. Once that is in place, then the target needs to be a break of $129, the June lows. That is needed to maintain food for the bears. September is historically not a great one for Apple, and interestingly neither are product launches much of a catalyst for the share price.
Apple stock chart, daily
The author is short Apple.
