Hynix (HXSCL, quote) is the worlds second largest maker of memory chips, and they seem to see what Apple (AAPL, quote) didn’t spell out last night but clearly implied and what Samsung (SSNLF, quote) had no choice but to say: smartphone growth is not what it used to be.
Smart phones rely on rare earths to work
The good news is that this is not specific to Apple (or Samsung etc), but the bad news is that it’s not changing for anyone in the industry anytime soon.
I said last night on Fast Money and have said from the beginning of the Apple/China discussion that the high end smartphone business in EM is not what it is in DM. Apple is not going to be selling $500+ phones there.
The silver lining is that Apple is winning back high end consumers from Samsung, even in China, but thus is not the path to glory.
Meanwhile, Samsung made it clear last week they see a competitive dogfight in the lower end Chinese market from local players.