Analysts believe Apple's stock price has not yet bottomed out and expect Apple's earnings to fall 23% next year

Apple's stock price has fallen 15.2% in May, from $209.11 at the opening on May 1 to $177.38 at the close on the 29th.

Despite this, Wall Street does not believe that Apple has bottomed out.

Morgan Stanley analyst Katy L. Huberty mentioned in her latest research report that Apple's stock price may fall as low as $160 in the near future, which means that compared with the closing price on the 29th, Apple may fall by about 10% further.

"We expect Apple's stock price to continue to be volatile, and the biggest risk to Apple in the near term is that Chinese consumers significantly slow down their purchases of Apple products, which could lead to another round of valuation cuts," Huberty said in the report.

The Greater China market is crucial to Apple. Huberty predicts that if the worst-case scenario occurs, Apple's earnings in fiscal 2020 could drop sharply by 23%. Although Apple may mitigate potential losses by raising prices, profits could still fall by 19%.

Morgan Stanley is not the first Wall Street giant to worry about Apple's recent performance. Last week, Goldman Sachs predicted that if Apple products are banned from sale, Apple's profits will drop by 29%; Cowen predicted that if the iPhone is banned from sale, the company's profit in fiscal 2020 may fall by 26%.

Although the research report released by Morgan Stanley maintained an "overweight" rating on Apple, the target price was lowered from US$240 to US$231.

On May 1, Apple released its second quarter financial report for fiscal year 2019 (first quarter of natural year 2019).

In the quarter, the international market contributed 61% of Apple's quarterly revenue. Among them, Apple's sales revenue in Greater China was US$10.22 billion, accounting for one-fifth of Apple's total revenue. Although it was down 21.51% from US$13.02 billion in the same period last year, the decline has narrowed.

Financial blog Zerohedge said that the decline in sales in Greater China was not surprising given the year-on-year decline in revenue in Europe and other Asian regions.

Cook noted that Apple's lower phone prices in Greater China and more installment payment programs helped sales in that market "stabilize and recover" by the end of the quarter.

Daniel Ives, an analyst at securities firm Wedbush, called Apple's China business "volatile" and said the company faces "significant headwinds."

"The biggest challenges are competition from lower-priced products, a lack of innovation around camera technology in its latest iPhone, and strong competition from Chinese rival Huawei ," Ives said.

Earlier this year, BMO Capital Markets analyst Tim Long said Apple's high iPhone prices compared with domestic Chinese phone makers such as Huawei, Oppo and Vivo "may mean that Apple's business in the Chinese market will be "tougher in the coming quarters."