Apple share prices plunge, taking valuation below $2tn

Apple’s shares plummeted in value by three percent yesterday, meaning the the tech giant’s valuation tanked $2tn (£1.66 trillion) for the first time since May 2022.

The company’s share value dropped to a price of $130.20 per share yesterday, marking a year-low, and giving the company a valuation of $1.99 trillion (£1.65 trillion) at market close.

This comes after after TrendForce reported that Apple product shipments had declined by 22 per cent in the December quarter.

Investors in the tech giant are concerned that rising interest rates and declining consumer confidence will impact sales of Apple’s premium priced products, according to CNBC reports.

At its peak, the tech firm had a $3tn (£2.49tn) valuation in January 2022. In 2021, Apple had clocked in a revenue of $365bn (£303bn) with over 52 per cent of the sales coming from iPhone sales.

Over the 2022 holiday season, the firm struggled to keep up with iPhone 14 orders during the holiday season because of COVID 19 related protests in China.

Over the last year Apple share prices have declined by nearly 27 per cent. Yesterday’s market close was the company’s lowest since June 2021.

This follows pricey legal trouble for the company. In December 2022, a French court levied Apple with a fine of near £1m over the functioning of its app store. The Paris Commercial Court found that Apple had imposed clauses on French app developers that constituted as abuse under French law.

Wall Street investors found this a dismal start to the first trading day of 2023 with the slump in tech giant values, according to Reuters. Along with Apple, Elon Musk owned Tesla continued on its downward valuation spiral.

Degrading the Apple stock from “outperforming” to neutral, Exane BNP Paribas analyst Jerome Ramel commented that it was “hard to justify a premium valuation.”