11:30 AM EDT, 03/25/2024 (MT Newswires) -- The impact of the antitrust lawsuit filed against Apple ( AAPL ) by the US Justice Department is hard to determine for the time being, BofA Securities said in a note to clients emailed Monday.

The DOJ and 16 states filed a lawsuit on Thursday against Apple ( AAPL ) for allegedly violating US antitrust laws. The suit alleges Apple ( AAPL ) breached competition laws by restricting its rivals' access to the iPhone's hardware and software features.

The lawsuit "highlights several complex issues" and "Apple ( AAPL ) is likely to appeal," BofA said, adding that it's "hard for us to determine a revenue and EPS impact at this time as it depends on what changes are instituted."

"While we are not legal experts, in our opinion, customers often choose Apple ( AAPL ) products (despite several alternatives existing) because of the perceived quality of the products/experience rather than a lack of choice of alternative products," the note said.

"If allowing more access to Apple's ( AAPL ) hardware, software and operating system features results in better performing cross platform Apps and users find other smartphones equally usable and feature rich for their needs, that might impact revenues (sale of 1mn iPhones impacts EPS by about $0.01)," BofA said.

"However, it remains unclear whether just enabling cross platform Apps, or allowing competing Apps on the platform would lead to much user migration given users' preference for the brand, overall quality and usability of Apple ( AAPL ) products and integrated ecosystem," the note said.

The investment firm reiterated its buy rating on Apple ( AAPL ) citing a "multi-year phone upgrade cycle driven by Gen AI and continued tailwinds from mix shift to Services."

The price target also stayed at $225 and BofA didn't make any change to its estimates for the company.

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