Early Apple Music Results Appear Strong; FBR Reaffirms at 'Outperform' (AAPL)

FBR affirms its Outperform rating and $175 price target on Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) following Apple Music commentary from CEO Tim Cook on Monday.

Analyst Daniel Ives noted that Cook said Apple had 6.5 million paying subs and 8.5 million free-trial subs for Apple music. The analyst commented:

This is the first time that Apple has given numbers around this key streaming initiative, launched at the end of June, as the Street is focused on success out of the gates on the streaming music front; we believe this is just the first step before Cook & Co. unveil a streaming TV service in 2016.

As we were estimating 5 million paid Apple Music subscribers by the end of October, we would characterize this initial stage of the launch as a "triple" in the streaming ballgame.

Now the goal is for Apple to further spread the gospel to/convert more trial customers over the next three to six months while adding unique content and services. For comparison: The leader in streaming music, Spotify, has 20M paid customers and 55 million free customers; but, importantly, we note that the company has been doing this since 2008.

We now believe that Apple is laser-focused on gaining significant market share on this front over the coming year.

For an analyst ratings summary and ratings history on Apple click here. For more ratings news on Apple click here.

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