Apple Q3: Discipline Doesn't Matter

Apple beat on the top and bottom lines and still sold off over 8%. I'm at a 'Hold,' and I expect it to underperform the market through year-end. Revenue hit a Q3 record of $109.4 billion, up 16.4%, with iPhone up 21.7%. The market decided 38x forward earnings already priced all of it in. Strip out tariff refunds, and 200bp of that 50.1% gross margin disappears. Memory costs are doing the damage, and Apple cannot solve a memory shortage. AAPL ran CapEx at 1.87% of revenue and grew free cash flow 52%. Meta ran 43.5% and lost 91%. The market punished both. I'm keeping direct exposure off the table. Investors who think big tech is overreaching on CapEx should look here first, but not at this multiple. Apple ( AAPL ) just had their Q3 earnings, capping off a slew of big tech earnings. It led strongly with a beat on top and bottom but sold off over 6%. This earnings season has shown me that the market is getting picky.