Apple’s Analyst Calls Have Been Scripted for Decades

Bloomberg opinion columnist Dave Lee:

Apple investors and fans hoping to get an insight into the philosophy of new Chief Executive Officer John Ternus on Monday were left sorely disappointed. The 51-year-old’s first earnings call was a timid affair, with Ternus taking cover behind a carefully written script as analysts peppered him with questions.

This is stupid. I mean, it would have been fun if Ternus’s style on the analyst conference call had been loose and freewheeling. Just like it would have been fun if the questions from analysts hadn’t been mostly insipid and pointless. But nothing has changed here other than who the CEO is. Tim Cook’s quarter calls were snoozefests. Save those recordings and use them to help you sleep. And that’s exactly how Cook wanted them.

What Ternus should do is follow Steve Jobs’s lead, and skip these calls except when there’s something exceptional to address. Let CFO Kevan Parekh and COO Sabih Khan handle them, the way Jobs used to let Tim Cook and Apple’s then CFOs handle them. At one point in 2008, Jobs had only appeared on three of the calls in 11 years. He then appeared on the call in October 2008 to address the global financial crisis, and again in October 2010 (one year before he died) to celebrate Apple’s first $20 billion quarter and to throw shade at Android, BlackBerry, and competing tablets. In the 14 years of Jobs’s 2.0 stint as CEO, he only appeared on five quarterly calls. That’s the way to do it. Show up only when you have something worth saying. Otherwise the message remains clear: steady as she goes.

★ Tuesday, 3 November 2026