14 DAY TRIAL // Following lower than expected demand of its 2018 iPhone lineup, Apple is rumored to have restarted production of the 2017 iPhone X model according to sources cited by The Wall Street Journal.
The sources quoted by the WSJ are supposed to be involved in Apple's supply chain and "said the resumption of the X is due in part to Apple’s contract with Samsung SDI Co., a major provider of iPhone X’s organic-light emitting diode display, or OLED, panels."
Moreover, the iPhone X production restart is supposed to allow Apple to fulfill the quota of OLED screens it is required to buy from Samsung, a number of panels already put in danger by the underperforming iPhone XS, XS Max, and XR launched this year.
The WSJ also reported two days ago that Apple slashed the number of iPhones ordered from Foxconn after the startlingly low demand for its line of 2018 iPhone models.
Furthermore, these two reports were following a previous cut of a third of the total number of iPhone XR units planned, from 100 million to about 70 million, as per a client note by Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
Also, Apple recently decided at the beginning of November that the number of iPhones sold during the last quarter will no longer be included in any of its future earnings reports.
Apple now only provides qualitative statements regarding the iPhone line's quarterly sales
More specifically, Cupertino will only provide a qualitative statement regarding the iPhones' sales as an indicator of the overall performance of their iPhone products throughout the previous quarter.
Even though some of the sources behind production slowdowns and iPhone order cutbacks have proved their reliability in the past, with Ming-Chi Kuo being the prime example, some voices see a short and distort scheme behind these series of rumors.
For this type of illegal schemes, the people involved usually have enough influence to push a company's stock value down allowing them to buy low and sell high, quickly making a profit.
These type of schemes are being closely monitored by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which during September 2018 charged a "hedge fund adviser and his investment advisory firm with illegally profiting from a scheme to drive down the price of San Diego-based Ligand Pharmaceuticals Inc."