UBS analysts project that iPhone global sales for $AAPL experienced a 4% year-on-year decline in February, falling to 17.4 million units from 18.1 million, attributed to significant weakness in both the US and China markets.
According to UBS analysts, iPhone global sales for $AAPL experienced a 4% year-on-year decrease in February, falling to 17.4 million units from 18.1 million, driven by notable weakness in the US and China markets.
They emphasized that in February, the iPhone’s market share in China decreased by approximately 650 basis points year-on-year to around 15%, attributing this decline to the strong performance of domestic brands. They noted that Huawei saw a 94% increase, Xiaomi rose by 34%, Vivo by 28%, and Oppo by 5%, collectively contributing to a 16% year-on-year decrease in iPhone sales.
In the United States, a mix of lower carrier upgrade rates and the strong performance of Samsung’s S24 series contributed to a 9% year-on-year decrease in iPhone sales in February.
As a consequence, the market share of iPhone sell-through for the month was approximately 48%, reflecting a decrease of approximately 350 basis points compared to the previous year. Despite these statistics, UBS analysts upheld their outlook of 51 million sell-in units for the March quarter.
Their estimation indicates that the March quarter is on track to achieve sell-through of approximately 54 million units, a slight decrease from around 56 million units last year. This assessment is based on the observation that January and February accounted for approximately 70% of iPhone sell-through in the March quarter. They concluded that considering approximately 5 million iPhone units were allocated to restock the channel last year, current demand patterns and channel inventory support the reasonableness of their 51 million iPhone “sell-in” estimate for the quarter.
