The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 53 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Kantrowitz: Apple wanted Anthropic Claude before choosing Google as Plan B
“Actually Apple wanted to go with Anthropic first, and they wanted to use Claude. This is according to Mark Gurman, said it this week. Turns out Anthropic, you know, was basically trying to chart and a lot of money, and then they eventually went with Plan B, wh…”
Kantrowitz: Tim Cook will likely step down as Apple CEO in 2026
“This is the last year, I think, for Tim Cook. Just, you know, not based off of any, anything more than reading the reports, but I think he's done.”
Siegler: Apple's next CEO will be John Ternus or Craig Federighi
“It has to be sort of between those two, between Ternus and Federighi. But everyone, you know, all the reporting points to Ternus. And so you have to believe that that's the thing.”
Kantrowitz: Apple targets smart glasses launch by end of 2026
“Apple is going to release its smart glasses targeted at the end of next year.”
Judge Mehta Rules Google Keeps Chrome and Android in Remedy
“And the judge who brought the ruling on Tuesday, Amit Mehta, basically ruled across the board, none of that needs to happen. It can keep Chrome, it can keep Android, it can continue to pay for distribution within Apple devices, and the partnerships can continu…”
Morris: Google Will Lose Exclusive Safari Search Deal from Antitrust Remedies
“They're going to have to share more data with rivals. They're going to lose the right to be Apple's exclusive search engine provider on Safari across its devices.”
Roy: Cook backed CFO over Schiller on 27% App Store fee
“So in 2023, after the initial decision, Phil Schiller had actually said that maybe we move to a model where Apple takes no commission, but apparently Apple's finance chief had come up with the idea around 27%. Tim Cook sided with the finance chief, Luca Maestr…”
Ives: Current fiscal year will be Apple's strongest iPhone unit year ever
“So regardless of what you want to say about Apple intelligence, if it's going to be rolled out in October, November, January, February, in the next, for this fiscal year, this will, unless some black swan event happens, be the strongest iPhone unit year ever h…”
Swisher says Apple needs AI partners because it doesn't steal data
“Why they have to partner with someone. They don't collect information the way the others do. They're not information thieves the way the others are.”
Siegler: Cook takes Apple executive chairman role with CEO-level pay
“Even though he's taking the step back out of the CEO role as executive chairman. He's getting paid CEO-level money”
Kantrowitz: Apple sent document preservation letters to dozens of OpenAI employees
“So the latest is that Apple has now sent dozens of OpenAI employees legal letters asking them to preserve their documents, and Apple has also said that this, they only found the tip of the iceberg.”
Kantrowitz: Tim Cook steps down as Apple CEO, John Ternus succeeds him
“Tim Cook has stepped down as the CEO of Apple and John Ternus is going to replace him as of September first.”
Google Barred From Paying for Safari Search Exclusivity
“I mean, now one of the interesting things in the ruling was that Google can no longer pay for the exclusive position Within things like Safari. So it can, can't be paid Apple to be the only thing, but it's allowed to pay for distribution.”
Apple and Google Agree to Test Gemini Model for Siri
“The company's reached a formal agreement this week for Apple to evaluate and test a Google developed AI model to help power the voice assistant.”
Kantrowitz: Acquiring Perplexity would be Apple's largest acquisition by far
“This is why I've been jumping up and down on the table for them to acquire perplexity would be the biggest acquisition in their history by far.”
Kantrowitz: The iPhone 16 will not trigger an Apple Intelligence supercycle
“The 16 is not going to be the super cycle. That's based off of apple intelligence. That's so many people hoped.”
Kantrowitz: Apple is doubling its advertising product team
“Apple is in the middle of doubling its ad sales team, or its advertising team, not sales, the team that builds ad products there.”
Siegler: iPhone Pro will retain a better camera system than foldable iPhone
“The pro will continue to have the best camera system. Largely, it seems like simply because of laws of physics, right? And the way that the foldable is gonna be more space constrained you know, by the, by its nature.”
Micron Achieved 84.9% Gross Margin Compared to Apple's 49.3%
“Micron's gross margin was 84.9% last quarter, and Apple's was 49.3%.”
Kantrowitz: Apple reassigned Vision Pro lead Mike Rockwell to fix Siri
“They put the person on Vision Pro on Siri and he fixed it. Wait, Mike Rockwell.”
Siegler: Apple will not show glasses, foldables, or AirPods at WWDC
“They're not going to show off the new glasses. They're not going to show off the fold. The AirPods like are maybe the closest, you know, thing that we have to an AI device. It's likely ready, more ready to roll. I just be shocked if they do that.”
Apple grew iPhone sales 21 percent to $111 billion without AI
“They, let me just say they had iPhone sales grow 21.7%. They don't have AI on the iPhone. Siri sucks. It's just the counterpoint to what we've been saying. They had quarterly sales of a 101 hundred and eleven billion.”
Kantrowitz: Meta poaches Apple UI design chief Alan Dye
“Apple's head of user interface design, Alan Dye, along with the deputy and maybe some other team members, went over to Meta. Meta poached them.”
Siegler: Tim Cook will become Apple chairman instead of fully retiring
“I don't think Tim Cook is actually going to leave leave. I think he would become, yeah, like chairman.”
Kantrowitz: Apple dramatically cut iPhone Air production after it massively flopped
“We also know that the iPhone Air is basically a massive flop there. They cut back production dramatically. It doesn't seem like They're working on a next edition.”
Kantrowitz: Close to a dozen Apple AI leaders have left for Meta
“I think this is, what, close to a dozen. Folks from Apple's AI division that have left to Meta, including a large percentage of, it seems like a large percentage of its leadership.”
Siegler: Next Vision Pro update will only bring chip and headband upgrades
“They're obviously about to release a new version with just an upgraded chip. It's apparently going to have a slightly better headband, which is nice because the current one is not any good, but beyond that, it will just be a chip upgrade.”
Siegler: Apple Skips John Gruber's Talk Show for First Time in Decade
“They apparently are not sending an Apple exec to John Gruber's talk show you know, event this year for the first time in a decade”
Siegler: Apple Spent as Much Time on Phone App as AI
“Apple spent three minutes talking about a phone, the phone app, like who uses the phone app anymore? Like, yeah, there's some nice little cute upgrades, but we didn't need to talk about that for three minutes when we talked about Apple intelligence for roughly…”
Kantrowitz: Apple Intelligence cross-app contextual features failed to ship in 2025
“I mean, if you think back to last year's event, we were promised effectively a contextually aware assistant, Apple intelligence that could combine signals from your apps and make your life easier by doing things like searching your Gmail and telling you when y…”
Roy: Apple generates an estimated $30B from App Store payment fees
“Thirty billion. Thirty billion. That's the estimated revenue from the, directly from the payment side of it.”
Kantrowitz: Half of iPhones sold in the US were made in India
“Half the iPhone sold in the U S were made in India.”
Swisher: Apple's stock is 10x higher under Tim Cook than Steve Jobs
“Tim Cook has managed to get over that, like, because the stock is so hot, you know, it's, it goes up and down, but it's about 10 X from when Steve Jobs ran it, right?”
Lanzone: All major search engines will route queries between AI and links
“This is clearly whether it's Bing,
Or ChatGPT standalone or perplexity standalone with hitting all the databases they're hitting or now Apple and Google and how they're going to do it. They're all going to be doing that the same way. And so for some queries, i…”
Kantrowitz: Apple's Anti-Tracking Changes Cost Meta $10 Billion in Revenue
“I mean, there was a real hit, especially with Apple's anti-tracking moves. We're talking about a ten billion dollar loss coming in or a contraction of revenue coming in.”
Ramaswamy: Safari restricts default search engines to five preselected options
“Outside of the prescribed five, You can't change the search engine on Safari to anything else, even today.”
Sorkin: Apple App Store fee terms have only stayed flat or decreased
“In fact, at Apple, the terms have actually only gotten better, right? They've, first of all, they've either been at 30% or in some cases they've since come down.”
Siegler: Apple is adding seamless cross-device phone number switching to iOS
“They have a new software feature coming in iOS where you can basically transfer your phone number from one device to the next super easily. So you could just say like, I'm using this device now, and it will take your phone number and put it over.”
Siegler: Apple's CapEx spending is down year-on-year relative to peers
“Apple is still going down relative, like they're down year on year in CapEx spend relative to their peer group.”
Anthropic previews Mythos model to around 50 critical infrastructure organizations
“The company is making a preview model of its new AI model called Mythos, available to about 50 companies and organizations that maintain critical infrastructure, including Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, and the Linux Foundation.”
Kantrowitz: iPhone 17 is driving double-digit growth expectations for Apple's Q4
“The iPhone 17 is proving to be a hit. It has, it led Apple to a strong quarter in the most recent quarter that they just spoke about last week, and there's expectations that it is gonna have a powerhouse quarter in Q four, double digit iPhone growth.”
Kantrowitz: Apple's largest corporate acquisition ever was only $3 billion
“Now, Apple's biggest acquisition in history was three billion dollars. So it's not exactly a company that is sort of ready to spend two billion a year or more on a integration partner.”
Roy: Apple Spent $410B on Buybacks Over Past Five Years
“Four hundred ten billion dollars spent in share buybacks over the last five years. Expected ninety billion this year.”
Kantrowitz: Apple iPhone Shipments Fell from 234M to 232M in 2024
“IPhone shipments down. Twenty-twenty-four, according to IDC, 232 million? Is it million? Yeah, million iPhone shipments. Twenty-twenty-three, 234. So actually, iPhone shipments are down. Market share, 20% in twenty-twenty-three, 18.7%. In 2024. The only reason…”
Kantrowitz: Europe Represents Nearly a Quarter of Big Tech Revenue
“Apple sales in Europe 26% of total revenue. Meta's ad sales in Europe, 23% total revenue. Amazon's international sales 23% of total revenue.”
Kantrowitz: Apple's China revenue share dropped from 18 to 15 percent
“Apple is still, 15% of its revenue in Q-IV was coming from China, but that wasn't the 18%. And that has dogged Apple revenue for quarters.”