Upfront disclosure – I’ve never been an Apple fan. My dislike started with my first ipod and the cluster of dealing with itunes and trying to load songs from my CDs. I think their marketing is/was phenomenal – “you’re a Genius if you buy our products”. LOL. You can’t go wrong appealing to the vanity or intelligence of your customers.

These days however, AAPL isn’t looking quite as smart as the competition catches up.  Here’s a recent article talking about slowing sales of the iphone and how Samsung is now the Number 1 manufacturer of smart phones in the world.

The pace of iPhone sales has slowed, Apple revealed last week. Part of the problem is that the competition has found a formula that works: thinner phones with big screens that make the iPhone look small and chubby.

For a dose of smartphone envy, iPhone owners need to look no further than Samsung Electronics Co., the number-one maker of smartphones in the world. Its newest flagship phone, the Galaxy S III, is sleek and wafer-thin.

By comparison, the iPhone “is getting a bit long in the tooth,” says Ramon Llamas, an analyst with research firm IDC.

Apple has become the world’s most valuable company on the back of the iPhone, which makes up nearly half of its revenue. IPhone sales are still growing, but the question of how fast they’re growing is of keen interest to investors. The iPhone certainly has room to grow: only one in six smartphones sold globally in the second quarter had an Apple logo on its back.

When Apple reported financial results for its latest quarter last week, a new phenomenon was revealed: Buyers started pulling back on iPhone purchases just six months after the launch of the latest iPhone model.

A look at AAPL Chart also shows weakness. A series of lower highs since the early April peak at 644. The stock has found support at it’s pivot twice since it’s May 20 bottom at $522 but the pullbacks at R2 in July tell me there will not be another breakout in the near term. Also look at the declining volume over the last 3 days of buying.

I’m not saying this is a short right now – but if AAPL fails again at R2 (now at $615) then there is $41 dollars (7%) of gain to be had if it pulls back to the pivot yet again

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