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It seems peculiar for stories to continue to ignore the economic situation inside China as a major cause for Apple's sales woes inside China, especially given t

It seems peculiar for stories to continue to ignore the economic situation inside China as a major cause for Apple's sales woes inside China, especially given the number of companies not named Apple that have also reported plunging sales there. We've had reports of a worsening job market and reduced consumer spending inside China since last year. >DONGGUAN, China — China’s consumers and businesses are losing confidence. Car sales have plunged. The housing market is stumbling. Some factories are letting workers off for the big Lunar New Year holiday two months early. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/business/china-economy-xi-jinping.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/business/china-economy-xi...

dmix 8y ago
The first bullet in their sub-headline does say: > IPhone’s high price tag is a major reason for the contraction That combined with lower consumer confidence could easily be the most obvious reason. With a small amount of nationalistic propaganda/marketing thrown in. The other big elephant in the room is WeChat becoming the primary Chinese mobile OS, diminishing the value of Android vs iOS. Which puts further pressure on the price of the phones, as they are more commodity-like. Apple raising prices, particularly in China, at this time might end up being the worst business idea they've made in a long time.
- GeekyBear 8y ago
  If Bloomberg's theory were true and the price of Apple's devices was the major issue here (and not the Chinese economy) then we would expect to see similar sales drops outside of China, and we have not. Also, we wouldn't expect to see falling sales in China across all of the device manufacturers (even those selling budget devices) inside China as shown in even this article. The reality is that the major factor here is that Chinese consumers are cutting way back on spending due to economic uncertainty inside China. It's something that has been discussed in the media since last year.

dmix 8y ago

The first bullet in their sub-headline does say: > IPhone’s high price tag is a major reason for the contraction That combined with lower consumer confidence could easily be the most obvious reason. With a small amount of nationalistic propaganda/marketing thrown in. The other big elephant in the room is WeChat becoming the primary Chinese mobile OS, diminishing the value of Android vs iOS. Which puts further pressure on the price of the phones, as they are more commodity-like. Apple raising prices, particularly in China, at this time might end up being the worst business idea they've made in a long time.

GeekyBear 8y ago
If Bloomberg's theory were true and the price of Apple's devices was the major issue here (and not the Chinese economy) then we would expect to see similar sales drops outside of China, and we have not. Also, we wouldn't expect to see falling sales in China across all of the device manufacturers (even those selling budget devices) inside China as shown in even this article. The reality is that the major factor here is that Chinese consumers are cutting way back on spending due to economic uncertainty inside China. It's something that has been discussed in the media since last year.