John Ternus walks into Apple headquarters as CEO and immediately inherits two problems he didn't create but will absolutely take the fall for. Memory prices are up. AI doesn't work the way people thought it would. Congratulations on the promotion.
Tim Cook timed his exit like a man who checked the weather forecast and decided to retire before the hurricane. Memory manufacturers are squeezing prices because they can. Apple needs more RAM to pretend their AI features justify another thousand-dollar phone. Ternus gets to explain why the iPhone 18 costs what a used Camry cost in 2019.
The AI challenges are even better. Apple spent two years telling investors they were going to revolutionize everything with on-device intelligence. Turns out running language models on a phone requires memory. The same memory that now costs three times what it did last year. The same memory Apple didn't stockpile because that would have required someone admitting they needed it.
Retail traders are already pricing in the turnaround. They read "new CEO" and think fresh start. They see "AI challenges" and hear opportunity. They're buying calls on a company that just promoted the guy who was already there when the problems started. Ternus was senior vice president of hardware engineering. He knew about the memory crunch. He watched it happen. Now he's CEO and somehow supposed to fix it with different business cards.
Cook leaves with a legacy. Ternus starts with a supply chain crisis and a product roadmap that requires components he can't afford. The stock will probably hit an all-time high because nothing means anything anymore and Apple could announce they're pivoting to selling dirt and analysts would call it strategic.
First-day advice for Ternus: blame the last guy.
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