AAPL is currently expensive but has ~50% upside due to strong product reception, pricing power, and future margin expansion as memory costs decline.

We're down about 1% right now on Apple stock event finishing here. You could see the typical kind of volatility. Not unusual that on event day the stock goes down. It pretty much happens every time.

And that's also what we said in the alpha report this morning. We're like, bro, it's it goes down every time. [laughter] No guarantees, but it goes down every time afterwards.

I will say it looks very similar and is at the same price point as the Samsung Galaxy Zfold. So, we're going to see whether or not uh this goes head-to-head in that market.

One of the biggest takeaways from this event is just how I high-end Apple has gone with this launch. You cannot buy an iPhone in terms of this latest generation for less than $1,200.

We only got the 18 Pro and the 18 Pro Max. That is a total departure from past strategy where you've at least had this baseline model where you can enter in uh you know a new price point to enter.

So clearly looking to make up for some of the margin squeeze with memory by kind of forcing people into these higher tiers. We've seen the company do this before kind of uh either phasing out a lower memory option or just starting you at a higher baseline and that's certainly what we are seeing here.

Uh and what I will say in terms of the stock not a great reaction. still down around 1%. Part of that might also be that the 18 Pro and the 18 Pro Max uh didn't hike the price more.

It was only $100 per model. We saw all pretty much already priced in rewarded when we saw 20% hikes to the Mac and the iPad. So, I have to wonder if if uh if shareholders were looking for a little bit more of the consumer to take that on.

Only other thing I would say is that Apple upgrade that leasing program we were talking about a few uh weeks ago certainly going to be coming in handy as you look at a two nearly $2,000 uh entering price for this new foldable phone.

That's should you buy it and ultimately what is this going to do to Apple's stock? let's be very clear just upfront about Apple stock. I'm not trying to shill this stock. I think I only have exposure to Apple in my retirement account.

It's not even in my main portfolio or my main exposures. This is like a just fully transparent here.

This stock always goes down on these events. That don't judge the event based on the stock movement during the day. That's a novice mistake. All the traders who got into it already got maximized out on rumors and now they got to cash out.

So, old news. So, you usually get a pop a few weeks before an event like this, which you actually did have in the Apple stock uh you know, share price movement. If you go look at the days out, you could see the peak of the stock was actually the day Leopold got liquidated and we never made it back to that. That was just five weeks ago.

I'm not trying to pump Apple stock.

Apple just destroyed them. I think they're trying to IPO using their last year's sales because they suspected that Apple was about to kill them. Apple is now coming out with exactly the same thing at exactly the same interval of heart rate sensing.

So, you're kind of now killing the Whoop and the Aura wearable functionality of better sleep tracking, readiness tracking, stress tracking, uh, and heart rate variability, which is what goes into these variables with the new watch.

as usual Apple will probably do it all better.

Now, how does this affect the stock? So, the stock itself is not cheap. It's relatively pricey, and one of the reasons it's driven up, in my opinion, into sort of this pricey element tier, if you will.

It's trading for a 3.69 peg with 9 and a halfish% analyst expected growth average over the next four years. You know, this is trading for over a three peg. Price to earnings ratio in the future is over 30 and growth is under 10.

That's over a three peg when you divide the two. That's pricey relative to other companies you can buy.

But this could be because markets are anticipating Apple's growth is going to be a lot higher. Myself included. I think Apple will probably grow because of this. Yes. Is the Duo going to cannibalize some iPad sales?

Yes. but it's new enough to where your incremental iPad buyer already has like two or three iPads sitting around. They're not excited about buying a new iPad. They're excited about buying the Duo because it's something new.

And the phone swap thing does open the potential for people who want to use two phones. One for home, you know, basic stripped of all the annoying apps and notifications and all the other crap and it's smaller and lightweight.

Uh, and then one that has everything that you need for work, the stylus, the full app functionality, you know, whatever else we talked about. I think there are going to be some people who go for that.

And I think that iPhone handoff feature and the Duo do open up a growth vertical that is not priced into the stock.

Even though the rumors priced in, too many people are like, "Ah man, whatever, dude. Who cares? Like Siri AI, that's that's where the next level of growth is." No. Like everybody who uses Siri today knows it sucks and people aren't buying the iPhone or whatever for for that, you know, voice assistant.

I'm trying not to trigger the name. People are buying it for the hardware. And so Siri getting better is like by default. We're all like, "Okay, we know one day it'll be better.

It's not good yet. One day it'll be better." H So I think this actually opens up a new growth uh category.

Uh, it definitely eats a lot of the wearables market, which is a win for Apple, uh, via the Ultra 3, although that whole Apple Health and AI advisor stuff isn't coming out until the end of the year.

Uh overall, I'm impressed. This is This event is exactly what I wanted and more. like the handoff feature wasn't in the rumors. The reality to me that I could set this up as a tripod or to entertain my children while I take photos with them, those are all bonuses.

The health updates on the watch, exactly what I was expecting.

Uh they are going to lose some iPhone Pro Max users. You know, I'm not going to buy the 18 Pro Max because I don't need it anymore. Maybe I'll get the new thin one, but uh I'll get a Duo.

And I think that's kind of what a lot of people will do. And now all of a sudden you just moved me up from a $1,200 phone buyer to a $2,000 phone buyer. So you you just increased your revenues on me at the lowest storage level by 66%.

These things are going to have shortages. I think they're going to sell out way faster than people think. And and it's actually very impressive. And Apple's growth is probably going to get written up.

Okay, so earnings per share that we have on the forecast are $883 and forecast growth for the next four years per analyst expectations 873 next year on EPS 1128 thereafter 1079 thereafter 841 thereafter divided by 4 gets me to 9.8% 8% growth, right?

So, I'm at a $317 stock, let's say, divided by 8.83, that puts me at 35.9 times. It's pricey, but if I divide Well, if I divide it by nine on a growth scale, you know, I'm closer to a four peg.

I rounded a little bit there. Uh, if I divide it by 20% earnings per share growth because they can jack those margins up, then all of a sudden, the stock is only trading for a 1.79 penn.

That in my opinion means the stock actually has some upside in it of about 50%. So if I add 50% to 317 bucks, I'm sitting at almost $500, 476 bucks

and and this is the kind of stock that in my opinion you don't have to buy and worry about are they going to like fail to innovate and go be bankrupt. Are they going to be late?

Yes. But are they going to totally fail to innovate and go bankrupt uh and get replaced by AI? [snorts] No, this is a great fracking company. Uh, so I personally am very excited about it.

I like the product release. I think it's a creative to what they're doing. And I believe that as memory costs come down in the future, Apple's actually going to keep these higher price points.

And guess who picks that up in margin? Apple. Apple picks it up. So that's my take.

Oh, and somebody now is announcing that check the duo pricing at $3,199 for two terabytes. Yeah, I don't think um most people are going to need two terabytes. I think that's a little excessive.

Uh I think that some 4K filmers will, but I think they're going to be using the Pro Max. That's that's sort of their, you know, target audience there with a variable uh aperture lens.

But if I go to the settings on the phone that I have uh I have well let's see here about general a boot you know like Canadian I got 512 I'm okay with 512 it starts at 256 at 1999 you know would I and what's my my load on this how full am I because everybody hates running out of space on this crap I have 143 available I honestly would probably go for like a 24.99 25.99 version at one TB whatever that actual price is.

I could be convinced to go up to one TB, but I don't think two is entirely necessary.

So, that's overall my take. Optimistic. I like what's going on here. Obviously, we got um uh you know, there'll be a lot of analyst rerating and expectations here, but for me, this is uh this is a fantastic move by Apple, and frankly, uh good job to them.

And I think this is the start of Apple realizing that they are the toll collector on the AI consumer highway. It's really when do they go when do they take the curtains on when do they finally go full blast on the AI strategy everything we've seen in terms of you know the Gemini and everything that they've created behind uh Apple Park when do you actually now start to see that to one that's going to be an incentive because the reality is 300 million iPhones today haven't based on our have not upgraded in over four years but

>> yeah they say that every year they say that every freaking year, guys. This is the year of the upgrade cycle. This is it. And it's always bull crap Like, you've announced some expensive phones.

They may look great, but if they don't have what you say they need,

The first step is if you look at the launch and and really how they're launching iPhone 18, this is they're they're going to sort of, you know, drip this out in terms of the actual AI technology and I think some of the enhancements.

I think that's important because this is not just a one-year cycle cuz you go to the 20th anniversary next year for iPhone that is going to be even probably more significant because what everyone's waiting for is when do you actually have an AI enabled device for consumers?

And we've said, I mean, I think 20% of the world ultimately will access AI through an Apple device.

I think given memory prices, they could have raised more if they wanted to. I think part of what McKenzie talked about, I think the stock maybe reaction is investors maybe fearing it was even going to be more expensive in terms of the price increases.

If you look at churn and what they've typically done, you'd expect minimal churn. I call it a $100, you know, call it 9 percent type price increase, but they have to manage their own margins.

And when you look at memory prices, that's not something that's going to curtail anytime soon.

Yeah, probably peak memory prices aren't really until 2020, end of 2728, you know, and then you got to start coming down from there. So, it takes time. The one thing that Apple I think hasn't gotten enough credit for is understanding that where they could raise prices, where they'd have to eat it, where ultimately partners within the supply chain were going to have to eat it because the one thing that they can have is churn at certain price increases.

And I think given what we see with memory right now, it's a tugof-war. They're towing the line. But now the stage is set for the Turners chapter which will be judged on hardware innovation but also judged ultimately on the AI strategy and that's where the baton was handed from Cook to Turnis at this time.

My take. They're going to sell more than I thought before seeing it. I was thinking it would account for 5% of revenue in 27. Now I think likely they're going to be 10%. Issue is going to be price now we have the price.

Uh but what about that review? Does it lead to a greater share of revenue than we first thought now that we've seen it? Do you agree with Monster?

Oh agree with Monster and I'll even further I mean it could be 15 to 20%. that big of if you think about pro max or prousers when you look at the innovations on this this is something many have been waiting for because again it goes back to you haven't had a true change from a hardware perspective on a mass you'd have to go back to AirPods

because vision pro is niche and obviously super expensive so now no one has an install base like Apple 1.5 billion iPhones 2.5 billion iOS devices and you call it a sleeping giant but now it comes down to consumers are waiting for okay what's next now then it comes down to as they roll out the AI capabilities not just in the US but obviously you know around the world when does the Alibaba relationship start to kick in China these are all steps internist recognizes this had to be an a minus because if it's a B or a C sort of coming out you know in terms of first sort of launch that's something investors and put them in the penalty box and he did exactly what he needed to do.