Market expectations are focused on Apple's annual performance, progress in Apple's AI work, and even signals of a "soft landing" in the US economy.
The market waited with bated breath for Apple's latest report to read more signals about the economy. Apple will announce its third-quarter report this Thursday. At present, Wall Street analysts expect its quarterly revenue to drop significantly, but they are more concerned about Apple's expectations and content related to artificial intelligence. According to Refinitiv, the market generally expects Apple's total quarterly revenue to fall by 1.6 percent, the largest decline in revenue since the third quarter of 2016. **According to a survey of 24 analysts by Visible Alpha, Apple sales may have fallen more than 2 percent in this period, compared with an increase of nearly 3 percent in the same period last year and an increase of 1.5 percent in the quarter ending in March. Analysts said Apple's sales fell, **possibly due to consumers taking a wait-and-see attitude towards new models in a slowing economy. * The third fiscal quarter is usually Apple's slowest growth quarter, as many demand may be delayed until the back-to-school promotion in the fourth fiscal quarter. Therefore, analysts pay more attention to Apple's expectations for the next quarter and even the whole year. These data help them determine whether Apple's overall sales are growing or shrinking, and whether the global economy is ready for a "soft landing. Bob O'Donnell, founder of TECHnalysis Research, said: "Apple cannot be immune to macroeconomic trends, although it will continue to lead the pace [of the smartphone industry] for quite some time. Analysts expect details of the new Apple 15 to be released next month, with the Apple 15 likely to have a more generally accepted USB-C interface on some models, and Apple's sales likely to get a small boost in the July-September quarter, a period they expect to have mixed results. Morgan Stanley analyst Erik Woodring wrote in the report:> The most important thing will be management's forecast for the quarter ending September. However, Apple has "traditionally" not provided quarterly outlooks, and analysts expect Apple may detail how it will use AI to improve its upcoming products. In stark contrast to tech giants such as Alphabet and Microsoft, Apple has so far avoided the term "artificial intelligence" in its campaigns, choosing instead the term "machine learning" to describe the field. **This month, media reported that Apple has quietly built its own framework to create a large language model known as" Ajax ", which aims to unify Apple's machine learning development. With Ajax, Apple has developed a ChatGPT-like chat tool called Apple GPT by internal engineers. According to the media, promoting AI development has been a major task of Apple in recent months. Several teams have cooperated on related projects, including trying to solve the privacy problems brought about by AI technology. But Apple executives have yet to develop a clear strategy for how to release AI tools to consumers. Still, the news helped push Apple's stock price to an all-time high. Wells Fargo analyst Aaron Rakers wrote in the report:> With the official launch of the Vision Pro, we expect Apple's latest comments about its AI ambitions to be the focus of attention. Any comment on the technology could boost Apple's stock price. Since the beginning of this year, Apple's stock price has risen by more than 56%, while the Nasdaq Composite Index, which is dominated by technology stocks, has risen by about 37% over the same period.!