# Tom Lee: The Correction Is Over — Stocks Are About To Surge

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

Tom Lee sees the tech correction nearing its end, while Patrick McGee argues Apple can build on the iPhone instead of chasing a new product category.

- Show: Prof G Markets
- Hosts: [Ed Elson](https://realalpha.app/people/ed-elson/)
- Guest: [Tom Lee](https://realalpha.app/people/tom-lee/) · Co-founder & Managing Partner, Fundstrat Global Advisors
- Guest: Patrick McGee · Journalist & Author
- Published: Nov 4, 2026
- Length: 35 min

## The best minutes

- [5:27](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=327) [Lee says AI differs from past bubbles while innovation continues](https://realalpha.app/s/lee-says-ai-differs-from-past-bubbles-while-innovation/) (7 min)
- [14:08](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=848) [Lee expects a post-midterm relief rally](https://realalpha.app/s/lee-expects-a-post-midterm-relief-rally/) (4 min)

## Also worth watching

- [2:19](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=139) [Zero-day options can make markets more short-term](https://realalpha.app/s/zero-day-options-can-make-markets-more-short-term/) (3 min)

Skip the sponsor reads, the Apple earnings, iPhone Duo and AI-strategy discussion, and Ed’s closing midterms prediction.

## Full analysis: Tom Lee says the S&P could reach 8,200, maybe even 8,400

- Lee says the S&P could be 8,200, maybe even 8,400 by year-end.
- His case is innovation and productivity, but financing and organic demand remain unsettled.
- Treat the forecast as a scenario, while measuring real adoption and infrastructure exposure.

Its 6 sections, what it means for you and what to watch are on [the page](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/#analysis), free with an account:

- [15:28](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=928) Lee’s rally call depends on the correction being finished
- [3:32](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=212) Short-term trading can amplify each new fear
- [6:49](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=409) Lee separates AI’s innovation from bubble financing
- [10:27](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=627) Slower growth does not prove the cycle has peaked
- [16:16](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=976) Lee expects midterms to ease data-center concerns
- [9:59](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=599) Operators should measure durable use, not token volume

## Summary

Tom Lee is co-founder, managing partner and head of research at Fundstrat Global Advisors. Patrick McGee is an award-winning journalist and author of Apple in China.

Tom Lee says the tech sell-off is likely near its bottom and expects a strong year-end rally, arguing that AI differs from past bubbles because it is driving notable innovation and productivity gains. He says growth rates can cool without ending an expanding industry and that long-term AI winners may emerge downstream. Patrick McGee calls Apple's results solid but says uncertainty around the iPhone Duo's durability and Apple's AI execution will shape how investors judge the company. McGee argues Apple can keep growing through better iPhone hardware and on-device AI rather than needing an entirely new product category; Ed Elson separately predicts a Democratic sweep in the midterms.

### Minute by minute

- [3:13](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=193) **Short-term trading amplifies swings.** Lee says the growth of zero-day options creates highly leveraged bets and pushes investors toward short horizons; institutions, which account for half of trading volume, have to respond. He also attributes recurring bubble fears to pattern-matching after seven black swans in six years, including COVID, inflation, rapid Fed hikes, tariffs and the war with Iran.
- [5:35](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=335) **AI differs from past bubbles.** Lee contrasts AI's innovation and rising revenue per worker with the internet bubble's cost-saving pitch and the housing bubble's lending to unqualified borrowers. He says AI would look more like a bubble if companies started inventing use cases without end markets. He describes some circular financing as ecosystem development, citing energy and RCA's investment in radio stations and programming.
- [9:11](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=551) **Growth can pause without ending.** Lee says exponential-growth industries do not expand at a steady sequential rate. He recalls Cisco's two quarters of 20% sequential growth in 1997 falling to 5%; its stock dropped from $9 to $5, then reached $18 a year later. He says token use can fluctuate through growth cycles, as mobile adoption did, without marking the end of the trend.
- [12:57](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=777) **AI's later winners may differ.** Lee says the long-term winners may be downstream companies rather than today's frontier AI firms. He points to Netflix, eBay, Expedia and Apple as companies that benefited after the internet's first wave, and says OpenAI and Anthropic may not be the eventual winners. He names SpaceX or Apple as possibilities.
- [14:08](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=848) **Lee raises his year-end target.** Lee says the sell-off is the fall correction he had anticipated, citing memory stocks down almost 50%, the AI trade down more than 20% and the Nasdaq down 10%. He now sees the S&P 500 at 8,200, perhaps 8,400, by year-end, above his earlier 8,000 forecast.
- [15:27](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=927) **Lee expects a post-midterm rally.** Lee says prediction markets and polls show a Democratic sweep, which he expects to be favorable for stocks. He says markets have rallied after midterms in every prior instance over the following 12 months, and cites 1954, when the S&P rose 13% into year-end and 33% over the next year. He expects big tech to court Democrats in support of data centers.
- [32:24](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1944) **Elson predicts a Democratic sweep.** Elson says he expects Democrats to take the House and Senate, describing the election as a referendum on President Trump. He cites tariffs, the war, a widening K-shaped economy and corruption as reasons for a likely rebuke, while acknowledging he could be wrong.

## Transcript

Prof G Markets, hosted by Ed Elson, with Tom Lee and Patrick McGee.

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there. Where the podcast’s audio and the video part ways, some times are a minute or so off.

[0:04](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=4) okay what else is happening the nasdaq 100 hit correction territory this week dropping 10 percent from its october peak october was also its worst month since march of last year with pain from the neoclouds and big tech weighing on the index it appeared for a moment that the ai trade could be starting to unwind yesterday however the nasdaq climbed nearly one percent a sign that tech investors might be putting their worries behind them. Meanwhile, Tuesday marked an important milestone for U.S. investors, of course, the midterms. We are recording this. before the results are in, but we still wanted to check in with one of our frequent guests on what he thinks the final stretch of the year will look like for the market.

[0:49](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=49) So joining us is Tom Lee, co-founder, managing partner, and head of research at Fundstrat Global Advisors. Tom, good to see you. I want to start with the NASDAQ correction, more than 10% off its record in October. just a lot of pain and a lot of the biggest names in AI. What do you make of this correction? Do you think that we will see more pain ahead? The market's been climbing a wall of worry for the past few weeks. One part, of course, is the war and oil and the inflation it's pushing through the pipeline. The second is this buildup of concerns around AI funding and debt. And, you know, are we in a bubble? And the third is some election uncertainties and the idea that if the midterms result in a democratic sweep, this will result in potentially a wave of anti-AI legislation.

[1:50](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=110) So I think investors have been worried, and it pushed us, like you said, into an 11% correction. I think it's very similar to the setup we had after the situational awareness collapse, where the NASDAQ fell 12%. In fact, the market's in the same oversold position. I think we're now in a position where the bottom is very likely in. And that situational awareness sell-off was followed by a 15% rally. I think the tech technology, you know, the triple Q, is going to do at least a 15% rally between now and your end. Why does this, and we'll return to your expectation and your prediction, but why does this keep happening?

[2:34](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=154) I mean, it's true. Like, this does feel like deja vu. And then in the other sense that it feels like we're repeating history is, you know, you've got the NASDAQ down 10% in the past month. And then you've got this rotation into all of these non-AI stocks, which is why the equal weight is up more than 4%. And so you look at the overall stock market. And, you know, if you were to just look at the AI names, you'd think that it's chaos. But the S&P has not been hit that hard. We're still up, you know, more than 10% year to date. So it almost feels like we keep on thinking. that a correction is about to occur. It does occur, but then it seems to be a lot less problematic than a lot of people expected. Why do you think this is happening? What are some of the dynamics that go into that? I think a lot of this is behavioral economics at work as well as mechanical. Let me just start with the mechanical. I think that there, as you know, has been an explosion of zero day trading options, so short-term uses of leverage. I mean, And that's basically the same as margin trading.

[3:43](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=223) It's a highly levered bet. And therefore, investors are employing a very myopic time frame.

[3:49](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=229) **Tom Lee:** They are not thinking about the next 12 months. They're probably thinking about the next month, really probably the next two weeks.

[3:57](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=237) And for the professional investor, the institutional investment world, which is still half of trading volumes, they have to respond to that. So I think the market has now become very short-term oriented. That's why quarterly earnings seem like long-term because someone's going to be like, whoa, that's not for another 90 days. But the behavioral economics at work, I think, is that the world has faced seven black swans in just the last six years. COVID, the inflation cycle, the fastest Fed hikes in history, the U.S. bombing Iran, you know, declaring war on Iran, these tariff wars on top of the GFC, which wasn't that long ago, and the internet bubble.

[4:41](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=281) And so I think there's a lot of pattern matching that people say, oh, well, we have another bubble in the making. This time it's AI. And a lot of people miss the AI trade. The ones who've missed it are the ones that are most declarative that this is a bubble. What do you make of the AI bubble concerns? Because, I mean, the way I look at it, there are some pretty clear signs of bubblicious behavior like circular financing. um yeah i think that's probably the most important one a lot of the sort of reinvestment in other companies um we're seeing some of those signs and of course just you know a lot of expectation riding out into the future about the ai build-out which we're not really certain of um but at the same time investors do seem to be quite cautious which is why we're seeing it reflected in the multiples and reflected in this correction right now i mean what do you make of the ai bubble at this point? Do you think that it is Do you think that it exists? If not, why not? And if so, what are the dynamics going into it?

[5:48](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=348) I've witnessed several bubbles, you know, because I've been covering markets since the early 90s. And the two that people would describe as bona fide bubbles are the internet bubble and the housing bubble. I mean, those are genuine bubbles. and it's hard to compare the current cycle to either at this moment because you know the internet bubble was apparent because the the type of innovation that was taking place was simply cost savings the internet in into 1999 was not a revenue story it was a brick and mortar to e-tailer model. It was trying to basically say, this is a new way to do it, but you could save money. And the housing bubble, of course, brought leverage and capital into the hands of unqualified holders. So it was basically a bubble where money was, debt was given to people, and then a lot of

[6:49](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=409) **Tom Lee:** people borrowed a lot of money. This AI story so far is one of pretty remarkable innovation taking place, like otherworldly innovation. And so I think as long as that pace of innovation is

[7:02](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=422) happening, and then we're seeing it as productivity for businesses, because revenue per workers going up, there was no productivity metric in the internet we could point to at all at any time into 99. I think AI becomes a bubble when we start making up use cases that don't actually have end markets yet. As far as circular financing goes, and I know people are making claims that that's the reason it's a bubble. I think people do need to be students of history. There are many cases where circular financing is not called circular financing. It's really ecosystem development. Some examples are, of course, the energy industry then would be notorious for circular financing, but that is the nature of resources. Another example is the early days of radio. RCA made radios. Then they had to actually create radio stations across the country.

[8:08](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=488) then they had to invest in programming across the country and imagine if someone said radio was a bubble because rca is investing in radio stations and in in radio programming they were creating an industry and that was not it would have been a huge mistake because rca was probably the biggest stock of its time until the 1929 crash which was not a radio bubble it was just basically a stock market bubble So I think, you know, it was more than 100x move. Cisco was 100x move. NVIDIA has been about a 10x, you know, from the start of ChatGPT. So to me, it's, of course, has all the makings eventually to create a bubble, but I think it's very early.

[8:54](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=534) I mean, I would just say during the internet period, and I covered it from 93 to 99, well, I covered it all the way through the crash and recovery. No one even called it a bubble until after 2000. In terms of the circular financing, I think one of the concerns, even if we would call it ecosystem development, is that it is implying that demand might be stronger than it would have been if the demand were organic. Like, if you didn't have these circular relationships, then you wouldn't see as large of a business. And therefore, you know, the argument is that this is sort of artificial growth that we're seeing.

[9:39](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=579) I think the same thing would be said about token maxing as an example. You know, businesses tell their employees, you have to use as many tokens as possible. And the reason that we want to do that is because we want to be part of this revolution and we feel very strongly about this. And then suddenly they say, actually, this is too expensive. Let's pull back on the token spend. And as a result, it does seem at least the growth of the token use is beginning to slow. Whether that's directly a result of token maxing, I'm not sure. But it does seem in those cases that there are these dynamics that point to an ecosystem where the signals that we're getting aren't maybe the purest signals of organic growth that are completely dependable. Do you disagree with that or do you not worry about that?

[10:27](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=627) I mean, I just want to point out as a practical matter, exponential growth industries don't have the same rate of change sequentially. Cisco, for instance, in 1990. 1997 had two quarters of 20% sequential growth, and it went down to five. And in 1997, Cisco stock fell 50%, and the data networking analysts said the growth story is over. And they said there's competition coming from internet protocol switching. So Cisco fell from $9 to $5. A year later, it was at $18. So growth, an exponential S-curve industry doesn't grow at the same pace. I think token usage still has the Jevons paradox at work, you know, and it doesn't mean every day and every month and every quarter it grows exponentially.

[11:16](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=676) I covered mobile. There might have been six growth cycles in there and growth recessions because, hey, you roll out GSM, then growth slows. Or if you roll out a new Nokia phone, there's an upgrade cycle and it slows. But everyone thought that was the end of the penetration cycle for mobile. And of course, it continued for 30 years. I think that token maxing and people thinking rate of change for tokens is going to explain the peak of the cycle, they haven't covered prior growth cycles. And again, I'm just emphasizing I've covered many in my lifetime. I'd say the real key is is ai no longer providing remarkable innovation and if it doesn't that's really the end of the cycle when you look at anthropics growth as an example does that make you feel more bullish on the ai trade i mean it's grown dramatically over the past year but one of the criticisms now that we have these q3 numbers is that the growth has slowed quite significantly to around 47% to 50%, I believe. And then next quarter, based on ramp data, it's expected that it'll be around 25%. And some people are saying this is not good. Do you think that that is indicative of a regular growth cycle? Is that the kind of growth that you would have expected from Anthropoc?

[12:45](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=765) Well, I think part of the confusion around Anthropoc is really its revenue policies and how they treat what you and I would consider like subscriber and organic and unit growth is not necessarily how they're reporting revenue. And so it affects the growth is sequential. And you know what? They'll probably learn that as a public company. And another thing to keep in mind is... that uh when it comes down to the fullness of time when we look back at the internet cycle and mobile cycle the long-term winners might actually be second wave companies you know downstream companies so like in other words open ai and anthropic are the frontier companies they're not that dissimilar than netscape and um cisco but were those companies the ones that you made money on in the next 10 years it's it'll be tbd because actually the history shows downstream did better the post-internet downstream companies were named companies like netflix you know uh ebay expedia tower stocks apple apple wasn't even in the first wave of internet and mobile you know they didn't launch a product until 2007 which is 13 years after the launch of internet and after the bubble had burst. So I think, you know, we probably have to

[14:09](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=849) have some flexibility to say, as my personal investment, how am I going to make money in AI? It may not be through Anthropic or OpenAI. It may be though, so I'm not, but you know, it may end up being a company like SpaceX or Apple as the long-term winner. Just going back to our previous episode, when we had you on in July, your prediction was that the S&P would hit 8,000 by the end of the year, but not before we saw a significant correction in the fall. And your expectation was that stocks would come back after that correction. Seems like maybe we could call this the correction. Do you feel that your prediction is tracking? Do you still think that we'll hit 8,000? That'll be around 5.5% higher than where we are now.

[14:53](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=893) Well, one thing I'd point out is I know when I was last on your show and I mentioned that possibility of a correction many people were very dismissive because the market had a lot of momentum at the time and i think that's what we have to be wary of is that when the market's strong people can never see a big correction ahead i do think we're now in this correction that i was mentioning because like memory is down almost 50 and the ai trades down more than 20 and as you out, Nasdaq's down 10. But I think we're at the end of that sell-off. I think the rally into year-end will be even stronger. I think we could be at 8,200, maybe even 8,400 by the end of the year. So I think we're going to rally above what I thought originally.

[15:38](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=938) All right, just before we wrap here. midterm results will be in when this airs. You mentioned that there might be concerns that if we have a Democratic sweep, then that might mean a wave of anti-AI or anti-data center legislation. Talk a little bit more about that, but also what are your expectations for after the midterms? Because your prediction assumes that investors will actually feel pretty good coming out of this election? I'm going to lean on that prediction markets and the polls show a Democratic sweep. So let's say that that is the outcome. That's actually very favorable for markets. In the instances where the Republicans lose and the Democrats take the Senate after midterm elections, we've actually seen some of the biggest stock market rallies. For instance, in 1954, the S&P rallied 13% into the end of the year and 33% over the next 12 months.

[16:39](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=999) **Tom Lee:** But 100% of the time, markets have rallied after midterms over the next 12 months.

[16:45](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1005) So I think markets are going to be in relief mode. The reason I think Democrats will support data centers subsequently is, one, then the big tech companies are going to court Democratic senators and House and governors to really make data centers good for a community and for the state economics. And I think they're going to shift into supporting that outcome. So I think AI will grow, but it's because the tech industry basically is courting the Democratic Party, which probably we should all properly expect to be taking over the Senate and the House. Tom Lee is co-founder, managing partner, and head of research at Fundstripe Global Advisors.

[17:29](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1049) Tom, we appreciate your time. After the break, Apple earnings disappoint. And for even more markets insights, you can subscribe to my weekly newsletter, simply put, at edwardelson.substack.com. support for the show comes from vanter when you run security for a company that's scaling fast the stakes just keep climbing more compliance frameworks more vendors more risk and a board that wants to see it all in one place but in actuality your compliance data is all over the place controls in one tool vendor risk in another, and customer commitments buried in contracts. Your team has to spend more time stitching it together and less time running the program.

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[20:55](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1255) And on the call, Ternus sidestepped questions about how the company was handling AI and personalized agents. Meanwhile, the iPhone Duo rollout is off to a rocky start. Customers have reported that the $1,999 foldable phone cracked within hours or days of use. Apple is also struggling to make enough of them. The Duo went on sale on October 23rd, after the quarter ended so its sales won't show up until next quarter's report. Apple shares are down more than 2% since earnings. Joining us to discuss Apple's earnings, the cracking duo, and how the company fits into the AI arms race, we're speaking with Patrick McGee, award-winning journalist and author of Apple in China. Patrick, thank you for joining us. Let's start with the earnings themselves. Revenue was up 12% year over year, beat estimates pretty good. What stood out to you in the report? Yeah, I don't think there was much to dislike about the quarter looking backward. I mean, this is a company that now has, what, $479 billion over the last 12 months. That's really remarkable. And you think the iPhone is, what, almost 20 years into its existence. And this is still the product driving more than half of revenue.

[22:07](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1327) And yet it's not the only game in town because you still have services growing by double digits. And the more the AI boom takes off, the more people are going to be subscribing to services like ChatGPT or Claude through their iPhone, right? And so Apple's still collecting quite a fee despite being behind in its own software development, its own AI development. So, you know, I think these were pretty wild, not, sorry, I shouldn't say wild results, Just very respectable results for a company that's 50 years old and, you know, I think has more than doubled its stock price in the last five years. And this is up something like 22% this year.

[22:37](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1357) For a company of that size and age, this is pretty remarkable, I would say. Investors were kind of had a meh reaction, it seems like. It seems like there are a few. issues. The margins for the next quarter seemed to be a problem, which appears to be a result of the massive increase in the price of memory, which is why Apple has had to increase the price of their own phones. And that seems to be eating into their margins. But, you know, there are also these other issues like the duo, which we should probably get into, questions about AI, questions about Siri AI. I mean, what do you make of the near future for Apple? And what do you think investors are really reacting to after this report? For any earnings results, it's always more about the coming quarter than the last results. And that's especially true of Apple because the Christmas holiday season quarter is the biggest quarter by far for the entire year.

[23:29](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1409) And in a sense, I think we learned remarkably little. I mean, they offered fairly conservative of guidance. So people could say it looks like, you know, things are softening versus the quarter that they just had. Right. So 12 percent revenue growth is what they just had. And I think they projected seven to 10 percent. And with people expecting something like 12 percent, that looks disappointing. I would just say, look, Apple is a conservative company that would rather sort of put out a low number and then beat it out of the park. So I basically read nothing into that. The duo really is a fascinating thing, because not only is it like a wild change to the iPhone interface, but it costs $2,000. So if they're able to actually make a whole bunch of these, and that's a big issue, and then demand is really high, that could really be quite game-changing for how much revenue they're pulling in. The problem, of course, is that you have all these cracked screens basically on social media and then verified through reporting. But we don't know how extensive the problem is in a sense because the iPhone Duo has only been on sale for something like 10 days. So in the best-case scenario, the problem of the iPhone Duo is an infant mortality

[24:26](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1466) problem. In other words, the screen breaks within a day or two of using it. What we don't know is if it might be something like a sleeper cell problem where months down the road, the same problem emerges later. I suspect it's the former. In other words, if you have a problematic, a defective duo, it emerges as a problem within 24 or 48 hours. But I just don't know that we'll have that data until they've been on sale or in the wild for, let's say, a month. How bad has the rollout been in your view? Because I haven't gotten the phone, I haven't seen it, but I hear about it on social media, I see it on my timeline, and mostly it's people talking about It cracked, it breaks. The sense that I'm getting is that it's been a pretty shaky rollout so far, which seems very un-Apple-like to me. I mean, I think of Apple as the company that only ships products that are literally perfect and have no mistakes whatsoever. This does not seem to be that product.

[25:25](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1525) So as sort of someone who's really studied the history of Apple, like, how does this rollout compare to previous product releases? Yeah, so look, Apple really likes to push the boundaries on what's even possible in design and then in manufacturing. And so it's not at all uncommon to have defects in the early process of building out and scaling a new product. What's really strange here is that this is happening after they're shipping to consumers, right? Usually this is something Apple would have worked out months before, at least weeks before they're actually shipping to consumers. So that's sort of the big thing.

[25:57](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1557) As far as how big of a problem is this, I kind of think we have literally no data because we're dealing with anecdotes in terms of how many people are on social media. And let's say the number was just orders of magnitude higher than you and I thought. Let's say it's 10,000 defective units, right? That would be absolutely remarkable. Well, not if they sold 2 million in the first month, right? Like that would be a hilariously high yield rate. In other words, like the number of defects as a percentage would be incredibly low. And yet Apple is just such a sort of, I don't know, iconic company producing such an iconic device that it can still go wild on social media, even if it's not actually that problematic.

[26:35](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1595) So, you know, I think where you're going to see problems is the fact that they are having difficulties actually building these things. I don't want to say they're having difficulty meeting demands. That's sort of Apple's line. And yet I don't think it's actually clear that there's so much demand for this product. But if you have a defective duo, you go back to the Apple store and they frankly don't have one to give you as a replacement, then you've got a real problem on your hands. And that certainly happened in some instances. But in other instances, they just give you a new one. So I think time is going to tell how problematic this is going to be. And of course, we are leading into the most important quarter for the year. So it could be a major problem. But honestly, it might just be basically over with.

[27:10](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1630) They could have very well fixed the supplier issue at this point. And at the end of the day, maybe it's only a few dozen units and we move on. Ternus talks a lot about Siri AI, which is their new voice-enabled chatbot. He also got a lot of questions. about AI, because this seems to be the most important strategic decision that Apple has made, which is that they have not joined this AI arms race, which every other big tech company has decided to pursue. And so they're getting a lot of questions about it, a lot of questions that he and the management team didn't really seem to answer, at least they didn't seem to answer those questions very directly. What do you make of that decision at this point? I mean, And we know how much money all these other guys are spending on AI, hundreds of billions of dollars by Meta, Google, Microsoft, all of these players.

[27:56](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1676) Apple's not spending seemingly anything on CapEx. Is that the right move? You know, when markets are bullish on AI, then Apple looks like it's this old timer who sort of can't keep up with the times. And when markets are bearish on AI, then Apple sort of plays the safety trade and it looks genius. And, of course, right now, the markets are in a bit of a tailspin due to all the spending and CapEx on AI. So Apple's looking good. So, I mean, this was great timing for John Ternus' first interview for earnings. But you're right. Yeah, we learned very little. I mean, that's very typical Apple. If you learn something about John Ternus on the earnings call, it's that it's Tim Cook 2.0 in terms of will we actually hear anything interesting.

[28:33](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1713) I mean, very, very tame in terms of what he was actually saying on the earnings call and the other executives as well. So, you know, it's going to be difficult to know, because I guess if you are AGI-pilled, then it's insane that the world's most iconic company really isn't playing the game of investing loads of money into AI. But if you're not AGI-pilled, then it's a genius move to sort of sit back and let people subscribe on their Apple hardware. You know, where Apple's actually doing quite well is with the Mac Minis and the Mac Studios, right? These are bits of hardware that are really good at running AI models.

[29:05](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1745) And you can download, like, the open-weighted models and have them running on your Mac studio without a subscription fee to the likes of Claude and ChatGPT. As they continue to iterate on that technology, Apple could have a very, very winning AI strategy, but it's in hardware. And what people are wanting is sort of in software, in Siri, in data centers. And it's not that they're not playing that game. They're not executing very well. But in times of sort of panic over how much CapEx is going on, Apple is sitting pretty. One of my struggles with Apple, I mean, it's done incredibly well this year. It's up more than 20% year to date. It's crushing all of the other big tech names. It's also very expensive. It's trading at 36.

[29:42](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1782) times forward earnings which is by far the most expensive of the big tech companies despite the fact that its earnings are growing significantly slower um and so i think that the investors they're happy that apple isn't just saying okay we have to join the ai race as well and we're going to do the same thing that all of these other guys are doing which i respect but at the same time investors are thinking they're going to do something incredible and for me i look at the company, I'm like, okay, what is that incredible thing? Those hundreds of billions of dollars that you're not spending because all of those guys are in this arms race that's not necessarily going to work out. What is your big project? And I look at the duo and I'm like, I don't think it's that. Certainly not the Vision Pro. I mean, what do you think is the next thing? And do you agree with me that they have to come up with something that is like generational, something as big as the iPod or as the iPhone? It's funny. I think journalists have been asking Apple this question since around 2012. And I think they've basically been wrong the whole time. I mean, Apple sort of realizes that the, you know, six inch rectangle in everyone's pocket that they stare at for four

[30:50](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1850) to six hours per day is the thing. There is no next big thing. I mean, maybe there is at some stage, but I don't think they have to be investing in glasses. I mean, I don't know if you have sort of any propensity to go to the store and buy the latest smart glasses. I have none. And even if those come out, I think they're most likely to augment the smartphone rather than displace it. So I think the question of what's after the iPhone is, in a sense, still too early to be asking. There's just no sign that people are going to stop buying the iPhone. In fact, I would say the biggest thing they could be doing isn't a new product, or I'm sorry, this is what they are doing, is improving Apple Silicon. So the more that you can run AI software on your device, I should say, rather than in cloud. In other words, you could be on an airplane, right, with no airplane access, no internet access at all, and still be running all these models because it's on the device, the better. And not only is that just like a good service to have in general, but if Apple is able to sort of keep a pace with the developments, in other words, what's going on in the cloud can mostly be done on your phone, and then they're iterating on that, then you might

[31:49](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1909) want to upgrade to the latest iPhone every two years or something, right? So you might get like like a sort of a more narrow super cycle in terms of how many mass upgrades are happening. And so that doesn't sound like a sexy answer because I'm not. not saying, oh, the new glasses are going to blow your mind. The Vision Pro 2.0 is finally going to really become a mass market product and have in price. But I think in a sense, that was kind of the genius of Tim Cook, that he realized that at the end of the day, it's journalists asking for the next big thing. Consumers just want reliability, faster processor, better camera. And that's about it. And they'll continue buying iPhones. So I know we want the sexier answer, but I don't actually think that's what builds the company. Patrick McGee is an award-winning journalist and author of Apple in China.

[32:30](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1950) Patrick, we appreciate your time. Thanks, Ed. We're recording this episode Tuesday evening, so that is before the midterm election results are out. Obviously, this episode airs on Wednesday, so unfortunately, we will not have any analysis to offer today. However, we will be discussing the results in tomorrow's episode, and we will be doing that with Catherine Rampell. and you can also hear my reactions and my analysis over on the Rest is Politics US podcast, which you can do right now. As you can see, I am not in my studio. I'm actually in London because in a few hours, I will be heading over to the live stream with the Rest is Politics teams to react to the midterm results in real time.

[33:17](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=1997) It's going to be my first time doing anything like that. I'll be running on probably no sleep, so wish me luck. In the meantime, I will just remind you of my midterms prediction. This is a prediction that I made way back in the summer when it was not very popular at all. And then I doubled down on that prediction recently on the podcast and also in my newsletter. And that is that I believe that the Democrats are about to sweep. I think they will take the House and the Senate. I think it will be one of the largest congressional defeats in history. And I think it will be remembered in the future as the fault of one person and one person alone, and that is, of course, President Trump. To me, this is going to be a referendum on the president. This is the guy who invented the cost-of-living crisis with unnecessary tariffs and a war that he said that we would never get into. Meanwhile, the K-shape has only widened. Corruption has proliferated and gotten really bad. And this is America's moment to say something about it. So my expectation is it will be a resounding vote of disapproval, and as a result, we will probably see a blue wave. I could stand to look very wrong when this comes out, but it's something I believe quite...

[34:29](https://realalpha.app/v/fbLTiHQKlOc/?t=2069) strongly. And so I am willing to take that risk, but we will see. Okay, that's it for today. This episode was produced by Claire Miller and Alison Weiss and engineered by Benjamin Spencer. Our video editor is Brad Williams. Our research team is Dan Chalon, Kristen O'Donoghue, and Mia Silverio. And our social producer is Jake McPherson. Thank you for listening to Prof G Markets from Prof G Media. If you liked what you heard,