Wednesday, January 23, 2008

MacJournals rants about Wall Street analysts

It has been an interesting week for anyone in the stock market, just about anywhere in the world. It has been an even more interesting month for anyone with stock in Apple. After hitting hitting an intra-day high of over US$200 on Dec. 28, AAPL has been in a steady decline, settling to just over $161 at the end of last week.

Then, on January 22, 2008 while Americans were celebrating Dr. King, markets around the world crashed. Apple had the pleasure of holding its Q1 2008 financial conference call the very next day, in the context of very jittery markets, with American indices also showing mini-crashes for the day. AAPL closed down 3.5% to a respectable $155.64 on Tuesday.

Shortly after market close, Apple announced that its last quarter was the best sales quarter in company history, with results blowing past all analysts' expectations. The after-hours crowd promptly reacted... by shaving 11% off AAPL's value. Why? Largely because despite Apple's stellar results for the last quarter, their guidance for the following quarter didn't meet Wall Street analysts' rosy expectations.

I lost a few bucks that day, but judging by their response, it seems the people over at MacJournals.com may have lost more. They have published a scathing analysis of "irresponsible" Wall Street analysts.

Ouch.