Apple announces record results for 2011 March quarter

David Heath
Thursday, 21 April 2011 10:43

IT Industry - Market

As anticipated, Apples Q2 earnings far outstripped the guidance issued earlier in the year.  But not by as much as expected.

Yesterday, an analysis of past earnings performance suggested that Apple typically exceeded published revenue guidance by 17% and earning-per-share by 44%.

This would have resulted in EPS of $7.06 and $25.7B revenue, given the guidance of $4.90 and $22B.

On that basis, it might be argued that Apple underperformed, with their just announced quarterly results of $6.40 and $24.67B.

But, these are record figures for Apple.

According to the announcement, Apple sold 3.76 million Macs during the quarter, a 28 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 18.65 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 113 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 9.02 million iPods during the quarter, representing a 17 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter. The Company also sold 4.69 million iPads during the quarter.

Of interest in these numbers is the lower than expected number of iPad shipments in the quarter - many analysts were expecting around 7 - 8 million; however many would-be purchasers of the original iPad would have held off once the iPad 2 was announced and with Apple's difficulty in producing enough of the new model, shipments have clearly suffered.

"I'm not going to predict when supply and demand will come into balance," Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook said. "I can only be confident on supply side."

One might assume that the massive increase in iPhone shipments would be linked to Verizon taking on the device, breaking the exclusive deal AT&T had with Apple.

With a typical eye on the future, Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO noted, "With quarterly revenue growth of 83 percent and profit growth of 95 percent, we're firing on all cylinders.  We will continue to innovate on all fronts throughout the remainder of the year."