Stock Market Today: Apple Rolls Out New Services
Stocks seesawed Monday, stabilizing after Friday's big sell-off. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI) and the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) were close to flat, with advancing issues and declining ones about equal.
Today's stock market
Retail stocks did well, but the financial sector continued to slide; the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (NYSEMKT: XRT) rose 1.2% and the Financial Select Sector SPDR ETF (NYSEMKT: XLF) lost 0.4%.
As for individual stocks, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) unveiled new services offerings and Winnebago (NYSE: WGO) reported earnings.
Apple introduces new service offerings
With iPhone sales slowing, Apple is launching new services in news, payments, gaming, and entertainment, emphasizing monthly payments for unlimited access and user privacy. Apple shares slid 1.2%.
The company announced Apple News+, which for $9.99 will give users unlimited access to over 300 magazines, newspapers such as the Los Angeles Times and The Wall Street Journal, and online news sources. Apple also introduced its own credit card, called Apple Card and issued by Goldman Sachs, that will give immediate cash rewards daily and has no fees at all -- no annual fees, late fees, international fees, or over-limit fees. The tech titan is also launching a new gaming service in the App Store next fall called Apple Arcade that will give players single-subscription access to over 100 ad-free games that are playable offline on the company's devices, as well as through streaming.
As expected, Apple announced a new TV app and spent considerable time during today's event highlighting artists that will be involved with creating original content for its new video subscription service, Apple TV+, which will become available in May. No pricing details were given.
Apple clearly plans to position itself as a champion of user privacy, saying it will not be tracking spending behavior, what users read or the games they play, nor will advertisers have access to that information.
Declining RV sales hit Winnebago
Winnebago missed sales estimates for its fiscal second quarter but beat expectations for profit, and shares slumped 0.3%. Revenue fell 7.6% to $432.7 million, well below the $462 million analysts were expecting. But earnings per share declined only $0.01 year over year to $0.68, beating the analyst consensus of $0.59.
The sales decline was mainly due to slower unit sales of recreational vehicles as dealers reduced inventories during the quarter to cope with a slump in demand. Revenue from the motor home segment fell 17.3% to $164.7 million and backlog slumped 38.6%. Towable segment revenue was down 5.9% to $250.7 million. Gross margin improved 1 percentage point, helped by the sales mix and improved pricing.
Investors clearly weren't expecting much from the company after a difficult 2018. Although the company doesn't give guidance, analysts expect improvement in the second half, with full-year EPS rising 11% over 2018.
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Jim Crumly owns shares of Apple. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Apple. The Motley Fool has the following options: short January 2020 $155 calls on Apple and long January 2020 $150 calls on Apple. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.