Technicians are working on the second-generation Globalstar satellite assembly line on January 27, 2010 at Thales Alenia Space’s offices in Rome. Globalstar is a constellation of low-Earth orbiting satellites (LEO) for satellite telephony and low-speed data communications.
VINCENZO PINTO / AFP / Getty Images
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Apple’s iPhone 13 has been revealed and Apple said nothing about the capacity of the satellites. This is bad news for Globalstar shares.
Globalstar shares were a big beneficiary last month after it reported that the new iPhone would be able to connect to satellites in space. MacRumors reports said the iPhone 13 would use one
Qualcomm
chip that could reach satellites in low Earth orbits. Shares jumped 63% on August 30th.
But the new iPhone has already come out, and while it looks like a lovely phone, it doesn’t look like it’s capable of satellite, or at least Apple didn’t say anything about it.
With that, Globalstar began to fall, with shares ending the day off 24% at $ 1.75. Other stocks of satellites also fell, including
Iridium Communications
(IRDM), which closed 3.5% at $ 45.92, and
AST SpaceMobile
(ASTS), which closed 5.4% at $ 11.62, also declined.
Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives stepped away from the launch and called Apple its “favorite big-cap technology name to play the 5G transformation.”
Globalstar investors probably wish they could say the same.
Write to Ben Levisohn at [email protected]