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If this is what stabilizing looks like, yikes.

I told you yesterday of a note from T.D. Cowan that said iPhone demand was more stable than expected in China.

Now Bloomberg has the China Academy of Information and Communications technology, saying sales of iPhone in February

were down 33% from the same month a year ago. To be clear the Academy doesn't

specify shipments of iPhones, rather attract shipments of foreign brands.

It pretty much means iPhones though, since Apple accounts for the vast majority of foreign phone shipments in China and is the only

overseas player with a meaningful market share, according to Bloomberg.

The piece has a few factors contributing to iPhones decline.

Among those are the later timing of the Lunar New Year, a contraction of the overall

smartphone market in China. It was also down by a third, and the resurgence of Huawei as a viable rival in the premium

phone segment.

For iPhone specifically, Canales analyst Nicole Pang is quoted in the piece expecting more of the same, it seems.

According to the analyst, February's drop as a sign of a slowing trend for the upcoming months for Apple in China,

especially when the Chinese peers are driving very aggressively the AI smartphone messages. While the state iPhone numbers from China might sound like cause for freak out,

J.P. Morgan analysts Amique Chattergy says,

they're no worse than the rest of China smartphone market when taken in context.

...