'Apple Most Worrisome Among FAANGs': Paul Meeks

Despite being the most valuable technology stock and being the most valuable company ever in terms of the market capitalization, Apple is the biggest worry among the FAANG stocks group, said veteran technology investor Paul Meeks to CNBC.

Another investment guru, Warren Buffett, recently purchased even more shares of the Cupertino, California-based company, calling its iconic iPhone "enormously underpriced." With an additional purchase made through his Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK.A), his investment in Apple now exceeds $50 billion, making it the third-largest shareholder in the company. (See also: Buffett Buys More Apple, Calls iPhone 'Enormously Underpriced'.)

Meeks, however, differs about the iPhone’s prospects. In his opinion, Apple’s ecosystem "is all based on the number of iPhone users, and we are seeing a slowdown in the iPhone and the whole global smartphone market."

iPhone Dependent Ecosystem May Hit Apple

The last quarterly results indicate that iPhone sales have struggled and marginally missed sales estimates. Though the company was able to generate more profits owing to higher-priced iPhones, the user base has remained flat, which concerns Meeks. Though the company managed to make good money in the services stream, Meeks believes that Apple’s “walled-garden approach" to its hardware and software may lead to iPhone sales impinging “the growth of services revenue.” With everything closely knitted around Apple hardware—iPhones in particular—service offerings may take a hit if Apple fails to sustain sale volumes. (See also: Apple to Hit $214 on Services: Morgan Stanley.)

"What happens with an [iPhone sales] lag is you will have a slowdown in the services business, because they are tied at the hip," he added.

Meeks Retains FAANG Stocks Stake

Though Meeks is not willing to sell his core stake in the FAANG stocks, he recommends probably “taking some money off the table—or at least not putting in any fresh money.” FAANG is an acronym for the market's five most popular and best-performing tech stocks: Facebook Inc. (FB), Apple, Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN), Netflix Inc. (NFLX) and Alphabet Inc.’s (GOOGL) Google.

The entire technology stack, and FAANG stocks in particular, have made big gains in recent times, leading to a few calls of caution. Earlier this month, Apple became the first publicly listed company to hit a market cap of $1 trillion, while Amazon remains a strong contender to join the club with its stock hitting all time high price of $2,020 a share this week. (See also: Apple is a $1 Trillion Company. Now What?)