Bank of America’s unique take on Apple stock as Ternus takes reins

Wall Street rarely changes its mind about a stock on the day a new phone gets announced. The number an analyst publishes is a bet on earnings two or three years out, and a keynote does not move that math on its own.

That's why analyst notes pile up in the days before an Apple launch. Firms restate where they stand, walk investors through what they expect on stage, and save the real estimate revisions for the quarter that follows.

Bank of America filed its note on Sept. 8. The rating and the target did not move. What sits underneath them did, however, and that's the part worth reading.

Why Apple launch events rarely move the stock the way investors expect

Apple (AAPL) shares closed at $316.22 on Sept. 8, down 1.17% on the session, according to StockAnalysis.com . That leaves the stock roughly 8% below the 52-week high of $344.57 it set in late July, with a market value near $4.61 trillion.

The pattern around these events is well documented. Shares have often drifted lower into a launch and again just after it, then recovered over the following 30 to 60 days, a cycle Bank of America mapped across 24 iPhone launches dating back to 2007.

KeyBanc Capital Markets put a figure on the same tendency, finding that Apple stock has averaged a small decline on launch day over the past five years and a steeper one five sessions later, according to Investing.com .

That history carries more weight this year. John Ternus took over as CEO on Sept. 1, and the "Surprise and shine" event at Apple Park is his first, according to CNBC .

What Bank of America expects from the iPhone 18 lineup and the foldable

Bank of America analyst Wamsi Mohan kept a Buy rating and a $380 price objective in a note published Sept. 8.

Measured against the Sept. 8 close, that implies about 20% upside.

Mohan expects three phones on stage: the iPhone 18 Pro, the Pro Max, and Apple's first foldable, likely branded Ultra or Fold. He models price increases of $150 to $200 across the Pro line to absorb higher memory and storage costs, and points to media reports putting the foldable at $2,099, which would make it the most expensive iPhone the company has ever sold.

Here is what the bank is modeling, according to the note:

Fiscal 2026 revenue of $477 billion, up about 15% from a year earlier

Fiscal 2026 earnings of $8.85 a share, up roughly 19%

September-quarter revenue of $112.7 billion and earnings of $1.97 a share