Apple’s best days are in the past? Tim Cook ‘couldn’t disagree more’

Apple CEO Tim Cook went on CNBC today for an interview with Jim Cramer on the show “Mad Money.” The timing is key; as Reuters put it at market close earlier today, “Apple shares post longest losing streak since 1998.” This, of course, comes a few days after Apple saw its revenue decline year over year for the first time in 13 years.

Shortly after beginning his conversation with Cook, Cramer asked him about some negative remarks that analyst Toni Sacconaghi made last week to the New York Times. “There’s no question that Apple’s best days are behind it,” Sacconaghi was quoted as saying.

“Yeah, I couldn’t disagree more,” Cook told Cramer, according to a transcript of the interview that appeared on The Loop. “Here’s what I see. We are in some incredible markets. The smartphone market — eventually everyone in the world will have a smartphone. Penetration today is in the 40s — a long way to go. [In] emerging markets like India, LTE penetration is zero. We’ve got great innovation in the pipeline — new iPhones that will incent you and other people that have iPhones today to upgrade to new iPhones.”

Cook wouldn’t talk about any new features of the iPhone 7 expected later this year, but he did tell Cramer that “you will need something else.”

Cramer responded that he couldn’t imagine anything else he would need.

“But we are going to give you things that you can’t live without that you just don’t know you need today,” Cook told Cramer. And that answer seemed to be enough.

“OK, that’s what I want,” Cramer said to Cook.

We’ll post the full video of the interview once it becomes available online.

Update: Find links to the interview here.