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Apple CEO Tim Cook attends the annual session of China Development Forum (CDF) 2018 at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China March 26, 2018.

Jason Lee | Reuters

Apple shares fell over 3% on Thursday, following a 4% decline on Wednesday, after several reports suggesting that Chinese government workers could be banned from using Apple iPhones.

The reported restrictions, which have not been publicly announced by the Chinese government, raise concerns that Apple’s products could get caught up in international tensions between the U.S. and China.

Greater China, including Hong Kong and Taiwan, is Apple’s third-largest market, accounting for 18% of Apple’s 2022 revenue of $394 billion. It’s also where the vast majority of Apple products are assembled. Apple declined to comment.

China has ordered officials at central government agencies not to bring iPhones into the office or use them for work, The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, although it was unclear how widely the bans were issued. The ban could spread to other state companies and government-backed agencies, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday.

While a ban on all government employees could reduce iPhone unit sales in China by as much as 5%, Bernstein analyst Toni Sacconaghi wrote in a Thursday note, it would be a larger threat to Apple if the bans sent a signal that everyday Chinese citizens should instead use electronics from Chinese companies.

“Perhaps more importantly, restricted use of iPhones among government employees could negatively impact sales among consumers (related family members; general populace) and could be part of a broader move by the Chinese government to promote usage of domestic technology,” Sacconaghi wrote.

Dan Niles, portfolio manager at Satori Fund, said on Thursday he sold his stake in Apple and is now shorting the company, citing the possibility of a government iPhone ban and increased competition from Huawei.

New competition

Last week, several Chinese retailers started taking orders for a new Huawei phone, the Mate 60 Pro, which quickly became a hot topic on social media in the country.

The phone starts at 6900 RMB, or about US$954, and uses a Chinese-manufactured chip from Huawei’s chip subsidiary, HiSilicon. Early tests suggest that the phone can access 5G speeds, although Huawei’s specification pages don’t mention it.

Huawei was placed on the U.S. entity list in 2019 over fears that its technology could give the Chinese government backdoor access to communications. The move requires U.S. companies like Google and Qualcomm to get permission from the U.S. government before supplying Huawei. The sanctions significantly hampered Huawei’s phone business, which was rising before the sanctions, forcing it in recent years to spin off some of its phone brands and contributing to a $12 billion shortfall back in 2020.

Huawei’s new phone has a chip, manufactured on China’s mainland, that uses the 7-nanometer production process. Smaller production processes tend to translate to faster and more efficient chips. This year’s upcoming iPhone is expected to use a 3nm process, manufactured by Taiwan Semiconductor, and Apple first went with a 7nm process to make its A12 chips, which were used in new iPhones in 2018.

But Huawei’s chip raises questions about how well separate restrictions on chip manufacturing technology, which aim to prevent Chinese companies from making cutting-edge processors, are working.

“From my perspective, what it tells us is that the United States should continue on its course of a ‘small yard, high fence’ set of technology restrictions focused narrowly on national security concerns, not on the broader question of commercial decoupling,” Jake Sullivan, U.S. national security advisor, said Tuesday in a briefing.

In Apple’s most recent quarter, ending in June, Greater China sales grew 8% on an annual basis to $15.76 billion. It was Apple’s fastest-growing region. On the company’s earnings call, Cook said Apple was seeing users switch from Android phones to iPhones, mentioning that was “at the heart” of Apple’s results.

“We continue to try to convince more and more people to switch because of the experience and the ecosystem that we can offer them,” Cook said.

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Microsoft will raise prices of commercial Office subscriptions in July

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Microsoft will raise prices of commercial Office subscriptions in July

A general view of the Microsoft office building is seen in Cologne, Germany, on November 18, 2025.

Nurphoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Microsoft said Thursday that it will increase the prices of Office productivity software subscriptions for commercial and government clients on July 1.

The company’s Office applications, which include Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook, have been facing increased competition in recent years from Google.

“We are continuously investing and innovating our platform for the future,” Nicole Herskowitz, corporate vice president for Microsoft 365 and Copilot, wrote in a blog post. “In the last year, we released more than 1,100 features across Microsoft 365, Security, Copilot, and SharePoint.” The new features have added value to the suites, she wrote.

Price hikes for commercial Office subscriptions have been infrequent. In 2022, Microsoft raised prices of its productivity bundles for the first time since launching the original Office 365 subscriptions in 2011. Microsoft changed the name of Office 365 to Microsoft 365 in 2020. In January, Microsoft announced a price hike for consumer Office bundles.

Microsoft offers Office 365 subscriptions for commercial use that include access to its productivity applications, along with higher-priced Microsoft 365 subscriptions that also include Windows operating system updates.

Here’s a breakdown of the commercial price changes:

  • For small and medium-sized businesses, Microsoft 365 Business Basic will cost $7 per person per month, up from $6.
  • Microsoft 365 Business Standard will be available for $14, up from $12.50.
  • Microsoft 365 Business Premium will continue to cost $22.
  • The entry-level Office 365 E1 offering for enterprises will still be sold for $10.
  • Office 365 E3 will jump 13% to $26 from $23.
  • The Microsoft 365 E3 package including Windows for enterprises will rise 8% to $39 from $36.
  • The full-featured Microsoft 365 E5 will increase to $60 from $57.
  • For front-line workers such as cashiers, Microsoft 365 F1 subscriptions will cost $3, up from $2.25.
  • Microsoft 365 F3 will be available for $10, up from $8.

The U.S. Defense Department and other government clients will face similar percentage price increases.

The various subscriptions all exclude access to the $30 Microsoft 365 Copilot add-on that draws on generative artificial intelligence models. Some companies have started widely rolling out Copilot, while others have held off on expanding their deployments, CNBC reported last week.

In many cases, organizations receive discounts off of list prices, but Microsoft has cut back on direct volume deals for some types of customers.

Almost 43% of Microsoft’s $77.7 billion in fiscal first-quarter revenue came from its Productivity and Businesses Processes segment, which includes Office. In October, the company said revenue from Microsoft 365 commercial cloud services jumped 17%, while seats increased 6%, mainly from products targeting small and medium-sized businesses and front-line workers.

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Microsoft president: 'Huge' challenge and great opportunity as global economy enters a new phase

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Cramer says this retail stock is ‘one of the greatest performers of all time’

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Cramer says this retail stock is ‘one of the greatest performers of all time’

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Google taps AI vibe-coder Replit in challenge to Anthropic and Cursor

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Google taps AI vibe-coder Replit in challenge to Anthropic and Cursor

People walk next to the Google Cloud logo, during the 2025 Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Spain, March 4, 2025.

Albert Gea | Reuters

Google Cloud announced Thursday a multi-year partnership with artificial intelligence coding startup Replit, giving the search giant fresh firepower against the coding products of rivals, including Anthropic and Cursor

Under the partnership, Replit will expand usage of Google Cloud services, add more of Google’s models onto its platform, and support AI coding use cases for enterprise customers.

Google will continue to be Replit’s primary cloud provider. 

Replit, founded nearly a decade ago, is a leader in the fast-growing AI vibe-coding space.

In September, the startup closed a $250 million funding round that almost tripled its valuation to $3 billion, and said it grew annualized revenue from $2.8 million to $150 million in less than a year. 

And new data from Ramp, a fintech company that also tracks enterprise spending on its platform, found that Replit had the fastest new customer growth among software vendors. Google, meanwhile, is adding new customers and spending faster than any other company on Ramp’s platform.

Put those together, and you get a clearer picture of why both companies see opportunity.

Read more CNBC tech news

Vibe-coding emerged as a phenomenon earlier this year after AI models became more adept at generating code using only natural language prompts, allowing users with little experience in programming to use AI to create functioning code and potentially full applications. 

Anthropic announced on Tuesday that its product Claude Code hit $1 billion in run-rate revenue. The coding startup Cursor, in November, closed a funding round that valued it at $29.3 billion, while also announcing it reached $1 billion in annualized revenue. 

Replit, which bills itself as an easy-to-use product for non-developers, could help drive Google Cloud adoption among enterprises, and expand the reach of its AI efforts beyond traditional engineers. 

Google is riding on the momentum of its new top-scoring model, Gemini 3. Shares of Alphabet have risen more than 12% since its debut. 

Google gathers AI momentum after Gemini 3 release

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