Benzinga - by Piero Cingari, Benzinga Staff Writer.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) shares closed 1.91% lower on Monday in reaction to the highly anticipated Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2024, where the Cupertino tech giant unveiled new advancements in artificial intelligence.
What Happened: At WWDC 2024, Apple introduced “Apple Intelligence,” a systemwide software update that promises to offer a personalized generative AI experience for users.
The new iOS 18, powering its flagship devices, allows for a more customizable iPhone home screen and includes enhanced versions of its in-house apps. Siri, the voice assistant, will now better understand natural language, process contextual information and perform actions within apps.
The AI features will be integrated with the latest device software, enabling users to summarize text and generate content such as personalized birthday animations. Privacy remains a core focus, with most AI processing happening on the device itself rather than in the cloud.
Apple also announced a partnership with Microsoft Corp. (NYSE:MSFT)’s OpenAI to bring ChatGPT to its devices and showcased the latest operating system for its Vision Pro mixed-reality headset and iPhone. Vision Pro will be available in eight additional countries, including Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the U.K. starting in June.
Why Are Apple Shares Falling After WWDC 2024? The market had higher expectations from Apple, particularly in terms of monetizing the announced innovations.
No new products were launched, except for the expansion of Vision Pro into new markets. Apple’s strategy to integrate Siri with ChatGPT highlights the existing gap compared to OpenAI in the realm of large language models (LLMs).
Historically, Apple’s stock performance during past WWDC events has been lackluster. Over the past 10 editions, Apple shares have more often closed down rather than up following these events.
| June 4, 2014 | -0.7% |
| June 8, 2015 | -0.7% |
| June 13, 2016 | -1.5% |
| June 5, 2017 | -1.0% |
| June 4, 2018 | +0.8% |
| June 3, 2019 | -1.0% |
| June 22, 2020 | +2.6% |
| June 7, 2021 | +0.0% |
| June 6, 2022 | +0.5% |
| June 5, 2023 | -0.8% |
| June 10, 2024 | -1.9% |
Not A Broader Tech Selloff Monday’s decline in Apple shares appears company-specific, as the broader tech sector showed gains.
Among the “Magnificent Seven,” only Apple and Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) experienced declines, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100, as tracked by the Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ), rose by 0.3%.
Key exchange-traded funds with significant exposure to Apple also showed gains:
- Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund (NYSE:XLK) up 0.1%
- iShares Global Tech ETF (NYSE:IXN) up 0.2%
- Vanguard Information Technology ETF (NYSE:VGT) up 0.3%
Photo: Courtesy Apple
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