Apple Inc (AAPL)

[Tex]

impossible expectations?

"It's a little frightening," said Jay Somaney, a hedge fund manager with TSG Capital in Plano, Texas, who owns Apple's stock but plans to sell it before the iPhone's launch. "There's no way they can meet the hype."

I like reading this kind of stuff. The expectation that Apple must fail, and a conviction to dump, implies that the major theses against Apple are false, because (a) actual expectations for the shares aren't really that high (failure is expected), and (b) people who like the company otherwise are piling out on the basis of fears that might not, after all, materialize.

I expect volatility to continue. My question is, what sales numbers are considered good sales numbers for other newly-launched phones? What are the benchmarks against which the iPhone might reasonably be compared?

Given the millions of units people are talking about being sold, it's doubtful that any first-day sales number will be a surprise for anyone. Anyone care to wager what sales number would be needed to provide a sales surprise for the first day? First week?

I think Apple is likely sandbagging iPod update releases in order not to cannibalize iPhone sales, which I think it expects to provide ongoing revenue and better profit. My question is when iPod updates would follow. In time for back-to-school? XMas? Hard to imagine how Apple is thinking about positioning these products. If Apple wants the iPhone to appear unique with multitouch, it may be the iPod isn't released until Apple releases Leopard and more multitouch hardware.

Take care,
--Tex.