Investors’ rights law firm investigates Apple’s earnings cut for ‘potential securities fraud’

Bernstein Liebhard LLP, an investor rights law firm, is investigating potential securities fraud claims on behalf of shareholders of Apple Inc. (“Apple” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: AAPL) resulting from allegations that Apple and/or its executives may have issued materially misleading business information to the investing public.
On January 2, 2019, during aftermarket hours, Apple disclosed that its revenue for the first fiscal quarter of 2019 would be over 7% lower than it previously expected due to “[l]ower than anticipated iPhone revenue, primarily in Greater China, [which] accounts for all of [Apple’s] revenue shortfall to [its] guidance and for much more than [its] entire year-over-year revenue decline.” However, on November 1, 2018 during Apple’s fourth quarter 2018 conference call, CEO Tim Cook stated that “[o]ur business in China was very strong last quarter. We grew 16%, which we’re very happy with. iPhone in particular was very strong, very strong double-digit growth there.”
On this news, Apple’s stock fell $11.97 per share, or over 7.5%, during aftermarket trading hours on January 2, 2019, damaging investors.
If you purchased Apple securities, and/or would like to discuss your legal rights and options, visit Bernstein Liebhard LLP’s “Join Class Action” page here.
Source: Bernstein Liebhard LLP
MacDailyNews Take: Not a surprising development, however we fail to see how Cook describing a previous quarter’s activity relates to a warning issued in a subsequent quarter. Apple gave guidance for fiscal Q119 based on what they knew at the time and the facts changed or became evident during the quarter, so they issued a warning prior to their earning release on January 29, 2019.
January 29th should be a fun conference call, by the way. Almost as much fun as Tim Cook will have at Apple’s annual shareholders meeting in February.
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