Had it been the same way if Elon Musk was the CEO instead of Tim Cook? Is the current CEO’s low‐key outlook hurting the American giant’s stock price?

Investor Dissatisfaction

Presently, the stakeholders, especially investors are irritated with Apple Inc as their shares languish below the $100 mark. It doesn’t make any sense of the share price as the company has $250 billion in the bank, which is a much lower earnings ratio than the market. Apple also has a massive cash flow generation in spite of sluggish iPhone sales. Whom does the investor blame?

There is certainly an element of truth that iphone sales have impacted the Apple stock woes. Saturation is inevitable, and product differentiation is essential to attract consumers. Yet, there can be other reasons for this downfall. Back in the days of the iconic Steve Jobs, focus was on generating marketing buzz in order to maintain the product excitement. Isn’t that the same strategy followed by Musk at Tesla?

Marketing Gimmicks

It would be rather an understatement to call Elon Musk a brilliant salesman. At Tesla, there is a new procurement every three to six months, whether it’s a giga factory or new updates to cars. Recently, they created an incredible buzz with their $1000 deposit strategy which thousands of people plunked down to hold their place in line. Although Tesla has lesser number of product launches than Apple, it is generating farfetched excitement due to Musk’s promotional style. This brings us to Cook, who was the operational professional without any craving for the spotlight while working with Jobs. It seems the product launches under Cook are quieter and more muted.

Strong Cash Flow

Despite the non‐presence of someone as charismatic as Elon Musk, Apple is definitely not in ruins with a massive cash flow. What matters is that the long term results and not the short term stock price management skills. For a company to run it would require for the fundamental cash flow generation rather than smart marketing campaigns.