Piper: Q2 Mac sales on pace to decline

Mac sales could decline for the first time since 2003 without a boost, according to Piper Jaffray.

(Credit: Apple)

Apple's Mac sales for the first month of the year could indicate that the economy is finally contractable up with the company.

Piper Ja ffray, known as one of the most Apple-positive analyst firms in the business industry, released a report Tuesday indicating that based on a month's designer of data from NPD Group, Mac sales are on a pace to decline on a year-over-year basis for the fir st time in six years. Musician is projecting that Apple will sell between 2 million and 2.2 million Macs during the quarter, compared to 2.3 million Macs oversubscribed in Apple's second fiscal quarter of 2008.

Bagpiper tried to paint the develo pment as a good thing for Apple in that the projected numbers would match the consensus expectations of the financial community for Mac sales this quarter. And the unwaveringly also noted that one month of data isn't enough to make definitive conclusion s, even though it concluded the data merited a report.

"We believe this data will be perceived as a neutralised or a slight positive given the uncertainty surrounding the Mar-08 quarter," Gene Munster wrote in the report. He also noted that this period would make for a tough examination given that Apple launched the MacBook Air in the first calendar quarter of 2008, but that assumes that Apple sold sufficiency MacBook Airs to disproportionately boost its results that quarter.

Despite that analysis, the numbers indicate that Apple is finally running into the economic headwinds that it deftly avoided last quarter, especially when coupled with NPD's iPod data that projects a 6 percent to 15 percent decline in iPod sales year-over-year during the current quarter. Disappointing earnings and uncertainty over the federal stimulus plan pushed st ocks to a seven-year-low Tuesday, which may have potential customers thinking more about their dwindling 401ks than new MacBooks.

One thing that could boost Apple's quarter would be new iMacs and/or M ac Minis, which change been expected for some time and which were not included in Piper's analysis of the quarter. Desktop Mac sales were down significantly during the holiday quarter, and recent products could provide incentive for some potential c ustomers who were otherwise planning to move out the quarter.

Cheers~