The European market has been gaining on the U.S., but Asia is coming on fast
When Baird’s William Power initiated coverage of Apple (AAPL) Thursday with a price target of $410, he backed his predictions with an unusually thorough 82-page report to clients that is chock-a-block with useful charts and graphs. The one above shows at a glance how important Europe has become as a market for the iPhone and how quickly Asia — mostly China — is catching up.
The map below the fold shows the 79 countries where Apple sells the iPhone (in violet), as well as the 25 countries (yellow) where it is coming soon. Note that 18 of the second group are in Africa, a fast-growing market for smartphones.
(Apologies for the quality of the map. We’ve requested a higher-res version.)
[Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter @philiped]