March 16, 2009, 11:08 am
PCs: Merrill Sees ‘09 Units Down 10%; ASPs Down 14%
Posted by Eric Savitz
Scott Craig, the hardware analyst at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch this morning cut his 2009 unit forecast for the PC sector to -10%, from -6%. For 2010, he now sees units up 1%, down from his old forecast up 3%. And he says his bias for 2009 “is still to the downside for 2009.”
“Our revision is predicated on deteriorating global business conditions, tighter IT budgets and weakening consumer spending,” he says. Craig notes that there have been some recent “slightly positive” production data from the Taiwanese laptops makers, but contends that “the demand environment remains constrained.”
Craig notes that ASPs in notebooks and desktop PCs tend to fall 5%-10% a year; but he’s looking for a 14% drop in 2009, due to a combination of slowing demand and the impact of low-cost netbooks.
Put it all together, and Craig is modelling PC sector revenues to be down 22% in 2009 and another 5% in 2010, compared to 4% growth in 2008. |
