Apple earnings up 12 percent for the third quarter

Apple reported on Tuesday third-quarter earnings higher than analysts had expected, but provided its usual conservative guidance.

Revenue came in at $8.34 billion, resulting in earnings of $1.35 per share. That's a 12 percent increase from a year ago, when Apple reported earnings of $7.46 billion and earnings per share of $1.19.

The numbers for the quarter were even better than what analysts had predicted: They were expecting $1.17 in earnings per share and revenues of $8.2 billion.

Apple also beat most analysts' expectations of its unit sales in its core businesses for the quarter. The company sold 2.6 million Macs, up 4 percent from a year ago, and 5.2 million iPhones, a 626 percent leap from a year ago. And even though the company's 10.2 million iPods sold during the quarter was better than expected, it's also Apple's first yearly drop in iPod sales, declining 7 percent.

The quarter ended June 27 is the best nonholiday quarter in terms of revenue and earnings for Apple--a bar that had been newly set during the previous quarter. Apple again guided conservatively for the fourth quarter of 2009, saying it expects revenue between $8.7 billion and $8.9 billion on earnings per share between $1.18 to $1.23.

Apple's earnings equate to more good news for the tech sector: last week had Intel, Dell, and IDC's survey of the PC market all pointing to signs of recovery. We'll have more details and will see what Apple executives and analysts have to say on the earnings call at 2 p.m.

For more on Apple earnings, check out further analysis here.

[technewsjunkie]

Only 8.4 Billion?
Paltry. Apple will never amount to anything. Nor will the Beatles.

[sciontcya]

You are correct.
Get a Zune II and a Windows 7 family pack now!
Thanks again, I'm starting to hate my APPL holdings :)

[slapppy]

Maybe, but that guy at Microsoft is not doing cartwheels right now. He looked like a total idiot today! hahahaha

[ballmerisanape]

"The quarter ended June 27 is the best non-holiday quarter in terms of revenue and earnings for Apple"

but.. but.. Steve Ballmer said.. but... $500 for an Apple logo... but..

[Seaspray0]

Their revenue is derived from all of their products... computers, phones, webstore, etc. When you break it down by product, you will get a clearer picture of where they are making their money.

[baconstang]

Yeah, EVERYWHERE.

[ballmerisanape]

Yes.. Macs.. and little Macs (iPhones).. Where's the problem again?

If there is a downside to this... please.. enlighten us Mac faithful so we can open our eyes and see the light... cuz right now.. it looks like the company we bet on is doing pretty well.. despite the economy.. despite what Michael Dell and Steve Ballmer have said.

My comment was intended to point out that Steve Ballmer has been consistently wrong about his competition.... so wrong.. that the opposite of what he predicts usually happens.

If Steve Ballmer were a a broken clock... he would be the 24H variety.

[ppgreat]

And only $31 billion in cash on hand. What a bunch of slackers.

They should just shut down and return that money to the shareholders. And give up all those XServes and Macs they run their enterprise on, and run Windows Server and Vista and .NET and Outlook and SharePoint and Zunes....

The trouble is that a lot of day traders will punish Apple for this steady accomplishment of outstanding quarter-over-quarter performance. Some pundits will point to this as a shining indication of increased future spending in the tech sector?but they'll be wrong as well.

It's about people's appreciation for good stuff. Period. And with cash as tight as it is generally, they are spending their money on quality products.

[Seaspray0]

With profits like that, they should increase the dividend to apple shareholders.

[DrtyDogg]

increase???????

[eswinson]

Increase.. I think they try to do that every quarter ;)

[sgirard]

There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance. It's a $500 subsidized item. They may make a lot of money. But if you actually take a look at the 1.3 billion phones that get sold, I'd prefer to have our software in 60% or 70% or 80% of them, than I would to have 2% or 3%, which is what Apple might get.

Steve Ballmer, April 30, 2007

[baconstang]

I guess those "Laptop Hunter" did the trick. R.I.P. Apple.

[Random_Walk]

"The company sold 2.6 million Macs, up 4 percent from a year ago"

...at a time when Dell and HP are still facing declines. That alone says plenty, no?

[monkeyfun14]

@Random_Walk

He's a known troller on Microsoft I can't believe you didn't see the sarcasm...

[baconstang]

I was hoping MS keeps running more. Maybe with Carrottop in one of them. Should make for a record 4th quarter.

[Random_Walk]

@monkeyfun:

Hint - I wasn't arguing with him ;)

[sciontcya]

@ baconstang: what I've been saying all along!
Apple should buy the rights to these and run them over and over in primetime!
Not only are they "not cool", they have no money either.
Take that Apple!

[ckh1272]

"by monkeyfun14 July 21, 2009 3:25 PM PDT
@Random_Walk

He's a known troller on Microsoft I can't believe you didn't see the sarcasm..."

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!! I'm sorry, but these trolls are becoming more and more like sniveling 5 year olds.

[Norseman]

Guess quite a few folk are still willing to pay that "Apple tax", eh?

[solitare_pax]

It's still better than the "Microsoft Penalty" or "Zombie Customer Service" you get with a PC.

[shellcodes_coder]

That ain't gonna happen after the release of Windows 7 until and unless you wanna get your computer hacker easily just like Charlie Miller did

[slapppy]

Yep. Better than that 10+ billion dollars already spent on Conficker problems. That Microsoft tax keeps growing and growing.

[Random_Walk]

"unless you wanna get your computer hacker easily just like Charlie Miller did"

Until Charlie Miller shows up on my lawn waving a geek-stick at my house, I'm somehow not all that worried...

[ckh1272]

@shellcodes_coder--That sounds exactly what a lot of people said about Vista. Thanks for the laugh troll.

[lkrupp]

Does anyone still believe that Apple called Microsoft to complain about the "hunter" ads? Yeah, they called all right but it was to ask Ballmer to keep them coming!

[Seaspray0]

ikrupp. guess what you want about the lawer call, but image perception of windows and PC's has improved since the hunter ads were started and run (as reported by cnet), not the other way around.

[baconstang]

Yeah, the image of being CHEAP>

[lkrupp]

The Windows trolls are strangely silent so far.

[Perry_Clease]

Wait until they have had a few beers, root beers for some of them, then they will get some muscles :)

[baconstang]

And 'Monkeyfun' is the first out of the box... or cage.

[Random_Walk]

...they haven't received their talking points yet from Enderle, Thurott, or Lyons. ;)

[Synthmeister]

Yeah, it doesn't really matter if you think the iPhone is a toy or not, it's still taking over the world. The 626 percent growth rate for the iPhone is astonishing. Last year this time, Apple sold around 700K iPhones, this year it was over 5 million.
Even more astonishing is the non-GAAP measures for the quarter were $9.74 billion!

Apple has made a $6 billion dollar per year revenue stream out of nothing in two years.

[CDubber]

monkeyfun14 will be throwing a rock through the window of his local Apple store tomorrow.

Finally - consumers are turning their backs on mediocrity. The tide turns slowly, but any fool should recognize that Microsoft's golden years are behind them.

[ckh1272]

"by baconstang July 21, 2009 3:32 PM PDT
And 'Monkeyfun' is the first out of the box... or cage."

With shellcodes_coder and Seaspray0 bringing up the rear. Mac and Windows really should just get a life outside of their computers. So much hatred over materialistic BS!! We like what we like and you hate what we like (and vice-versa). WE GET IT NOW GO AWAY and take Mr. Dee, Applerocks1963, and maggiered with you!!

[Mark_Anderson]

Great numbers. It's clear the Macbook refresh and price cut has had a positive impact on sales growth. Interesting that both Gartner and IDC got their sums wrong and I wonder if this was down to them making pre refresh estimates? Regardless I hope this trend continues.

iPod sales are no surprise. The Shuffle was rubbish and why would anyone buy an iPod Classic when you can buy an iPod Touch for not much more money? I think Apple are swinging away from the traditional mp3 player market.

Finally, no-one should be surprised by iPhone sales by now - it's a 15-20 million a year banker.

[Perry_Clease]

"The Shuffle was rubbish"

I gotta disagree with you on that. I have one and find it very useful, very handy when walking, jogging and such. Note that it is not my primary iPod.

[baconstang]

If one wants an iPod that can hold a lot, you have to go with the hard drive. I have a 16G Touch, but that only hold about a tenth of my music library.

[Seaspray0]

The shuffle was better before the proprietary earphones.

[Perry_Clease]

@Seaspray0 "The shuffle was better before the proprietary earphones."

That too I need to disagree with. It took me a few minutes to learn how to use those earphone/buds with VoiceOver, and again I find it handy. Sure having controls on the iPod itself and on the earpiece cord would be nice, but the Shuffle is very small, maybe in the next model. My only complaint about the Apple supplied earbuds is that they fall out of my ears easy, other people may not have that problem. 3rd party folks are coming out with in-ear buds for the new Shuffle as well as some other "solutions." See scosche.com and look at the tapSTICK and tapLINE products.

My prediction is that all future iPods will VoiceOver, but the bigger ones will also have traditional controls on the pod.

Check one out when you get a chance.

[RompStar_420]

I qualify to get an iPhone here pretty soon, July 24th, yep, sales will continue to climb. Big corporations things that customers are sheet and are stupid. I can tell when someone copies Apple and then claims that their phone is better!

No one came out with a better phone to date, everything that is coming out right now is based off of what Apple has accomplished.

MS phones still suck! and crash and freeze and burn.

And those Jills at Redmond will want you to believe something else, it's all lies I tell you, all lies!!!!!

[iBuzz]

And don't forget John Dvorak's prediction about the iPhone before it was released:

"Apple should pull the plug on the iPhone. The company risks its reputation in a competitive business... It's the loyalists who keep promoting this device as if it is going to be anything other than another phone in a crowded market.... There is no likelihood that Apple can be successful in a business this competitive... I'd advise you to cover your eyes. You're not going to like what you'll see."

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/apple-should-pull-the-plug-on-the-iphone

[baconstang]

That article is hilarious! Rarely have I read something that was so completely off the mark. Dvorak's foresight is breathtaking.

[Seaspray0]

Not as breathtaking as Michael Dell's comments.

[eswinson]

Usually the only thing more off the mark than a Dvorak article is another Dvorak article

[drbyte]

Sooner or later a Ipod user see's a friend's Sansa or Zune and marvels at the ease of moving songs on and off the player without them being re-named and indexed with bloat software. I was surprised at the lack of freedom you have. Glad I went with my Sansa 8gb player.

I wish the Apple music players weren't so closed off, they are pretty.

[baconstang]

It would seem you haven't discovered all the abilities of iPod/iTunes, nor Senuti.

[sciontcya]

You, and 19 other Windoze fanboyees.
Enjoy - truly.
How much SanDisk stock do you want?

[Seaspray0]

Having the mp3 player show up as a removable disk device is a nice function.

[baconstang]

My HDD iPods show up as such. You just have to check a box.

[AllenKids]

@drbyte

You can keep your file name as it is, also you can very much drag & drop in iTunes, just check the manually manage music & videos box.

Also you obviously didn't own a Zune or even played with one. The Zune syncing mechanism is very much like a iPod, you need a Zune software, everything drag & drop via Mass Storage Device Mode wouldn't at all appear on the device's media library. Zune can sync via WiFi though, and that's neat.

[drbyte]

Sorry, I meant the Fuze player.

Your rigjt, I didn't discover the abilities of the Ipod. You don't have to discover anything to use the Sansa's. IT was confusing trying to navigate thru itunes, and I didin't like the fact I had to use the software to manage music.

Having the Sansa behave like a removable disk is nice. I can use it without having to install any resource grabbing software. Plus the usb cord in (or use my micro sd card), Copy, paste and delete. All I need to do. When Ipods are like that then I'll consider one.

Ipod touch are sweet devices, I just like the freedom with the Sansa. If Apple ever changes the way they do mp3 storage and lower the price a bit I'd get one for sure. Maybe I'll lose the windoze fanboy stigma.

[AllenKids]

@drbyte

Sorry to break it to you. But...

Drag & Drop is not superior, it's a matter of personal preference.

While I can respect your reluctance to adopt the "syncing" scheme. But sometimes drag & drop just wouldn't work, at least not as easily and smoothly.

Try drag & drop podcasts, there is too much manually management involved, and you end up with a lot of un-listened feeds. After a while, you may start to look for an "auto drop" application to save you the trouble. Wait a minute, that's syncing!

Well, you may not be a avid podcast listener.

What about incompatible media formats? Music most of times wouldn't be a problem unless you are going all fancy about some wacky lossless codecs. But what about video? You just drag & drop with firm confidence your video will always play on your portable device? Hint: They don't. So you are either going to remember which file is compatible which is not, or resort to library index like file names, or even better, a particular folder for all your compatible media.

Messy, unnecessary & stubborn. That's drag & drop is. The supposedly easy of use quickly become chaotic once you step beyond its limited capability.

I prefer syncing, iPod's syncing is still the best in the industry, I just wish Apple could remove its stupid one computer only tie so I don't have to completely erase my iPod everytime I plug it into another machine. If the machine is authorized to use my account, I see no reason keep wiping the iPod library.

[shellcodes_coder]

Apple goes down to 5th position. That's cool
I can only image what will happen to endangered os--snow leopard after the release of Windows 7. Oh yeah Windows 7 is the best selling software in the UK right now :)

[baconstang]

Wait till they actually get W7.

The trouble with selling Macs is they last too long. Mac users don't have to replace them every 2 or 3 years.

[Oahu808]

Apple didn't drop to 5th

That was IDC saying that based on their made up analysis BEFORE Apple reported numbers. IDC said Apple shipments would drop -12%, so they estimated that would drop them to 5th.

Since IDC was TOTALLY OFF. Apple shipments were up +4%, so they probably went up to 3rd

[ckh1272]

@shellcodes_coder---You truly are the mental midget of mental midgets.

[ckh1272]

@shellcodes_coder---Also, please provide some proof next time. Of course that may be asking a little much.