Quoted: Apple shares plunge, but Tim Cook says all’s well in China

Cook said, in an emailed response to questions about the company’s business in China, iPhone activations in China had accelerated over the past few weeks and the App Store in China had the best performance of year for over the past two weeks.

CNBC’s Jim Cramer shared the message with his audience as Apple’s stock plummeted more than 13 percent Monday morning.

The shares recovered to trade down 1.6 percent at $104.02 as the market pared some losses and investor’s took note of Cook’s comments.

No matter the reason, US stock markets may suffer only a moderately bad day, it appears.

Cook remains confident about the company’s prospects in the Chinese market, despite the slump.

About 30 minutes before market close, Apple shares were down 3.28% at $102.99 per share after being up 2% at $107.81 per share immediately following the positive commentary. A report last week didn’t help, either: China smartphone sales fell for the first time in the second quarter, with Gartner saying that nation’s market has “reached saturation”.

More recently, the fall in Apple’s stock price has been attributable to the continued devaluation of the Chinese yuan, compared to the US dollar. Investors are hence fearful that Apple’s ambitions in China may have reached a stalemate.

Those sentiments appeared to boost Apple’s stock back to almost where it ended last week.

Apple hasn’t officially confirmed its expected September 9th iPhone 6S event just yet, but we now know where Tim Cook will be at the end of next month.

“If iPhone units are down, the stock could continue to tread water and underperform relative to the market in the near term”, Toni Sacconaghi, technology analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, told CNBC on Friday.

Offering up a mid-quarter comment on market performance is unheard of for Apple, and was likely a sign that the company’s executives saw a serious problem brewing that they needed to get under control as quickly as they could.