China Smart Phones Sales Fall 54.7% In February

March 9, 2020 by Jonathan Custer

After locking down large parts of the country to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, total mobile phone sales fell 54.7% to 6.34 million down from 14 million in February 2019. It was also the lowest level for February since at least 2012 when China Academy of Information and Communications Technology showed (CAICT) started publishing data.

Apple sold 494,000 down from 1.27 million in February 2019 the government data showed. Apple stores in China were shuttered for more than two weeks in February as fears over the epidemic increased.

Android brands accounted for most of the drop with shipments declining from 12.72 million units in February 2019 to 5.85 million.

Research firms IDC and Canalys forecast smartphone shipments will drop by about 40% in the first quarter.

While this is very nervous time…we caution that Chinese demand in the March quarter is not the trend, but a “shock event” that we believe will be short lived. — Daniel Ives, Wedbush analyst

See Reuters article here