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Citi analysts have published the most pessimistic forecast for the iPhone X yet

Tim Cook sad unhappy
Apple CEO Tim Cook. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

  • The iPhone X isn't selling as well as expected, and analysts are racing to downgrade their shipment forecasts for the $1,000 phone over the next few months.
  • Analysts at Citi gave the most pessimistic forecast, downgrading first-quarter shipments to 14 million units from 27 million.
  • Analysts have previously blamed the "sluggish" demand on what they see as a lack of interesting innovation, the iPhone X's price, and increased competition from Chinese manufacturers.

Here's the most pessimistic forecast yet for Apple's iPhone X shipments during the first half of this year.

Analysts at Citi dramatically revised down their iPhone X shipment forecast, citing "sluggish" demand for the $1,000 phone.

In a note to investors, they predicted 14 million iPhone X shipments for the first three months of 2018, then just 7 million shipments for the second quarter. That's down from 32 million for the last quarter of 2017, when the phone went on sale.

These are the most pessimistic numbers we've seen yet, as analysts race to downgrade their iPhone X shipment forecasts. In December, some analysts estimated shipments of about 25 million units in the first quarter alone.

Here's what Citi's analysts wrote, emphasis ours:

"We reduce our 1Q18E and 2Q18E iPhone build forecast mainly due to sluggish iPhone X demand. For 1Q18E, we now forecast overall iPhone shipment of 51m vs. 61m previously. We reduce 1Q18E iPhone X shipment to 14m from 27m. For 2Q18E, we trim total iPhone shipment to 40m from 48m previously as we revise down iPhone X shipment to 7m. Overall, we now model 1H18E total iPhone build of 92m vs. 85m in 1H17E, up 7% [year on year]."

Analysts have blamed the iPhone X's poor performance on what they see as its lack of interesting innovation and its high price.

Alternative iPhone models are also readily available. A Piper Jaffray survey found that a large chunk of iPhone owners who didn't upgrade to the iPhone X said they were perfectly happy with their existing devices.

Apple iPhone X

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