Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) declared yesterday that it will report its fiscal first-quarter financial results on January 23. The quarter is expected to be Apple’s strongest, fueled by strong sales of the company’s products during the money-spinning holiday shopping season.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), while announcing its revenue for the fourth quarter, said that it is foreseeing a revenue of $52 billion and projected earnings of $11.75 per share for the first quarter of 2013. Wall street is holding the view that Apple will surpass the $52 billion mark, and will record $54.5 billion in revenue, and earnings of $13.32 per share.
Much of that tally is expected to be maintained by sales of the iPhone, which continues to be Apple’s top selling product. Apple’s iPhone 5 was on sale for the whole last quarter, while its most recent iPods and iPads were launched near the end of October. The company also refurbished much of its Mac computer series, but the iMac models started shipping near the end of the quarter.
In the last quarter of 2012, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) recorded a revenue of $36 billion with earnings of $8.67 per share. The iPhone maker posted $8.2 billion in profit. The revenue numbers surpassed industry expectations, but profit did not.
“We’re pleased to have generated over $41 billion in net income and over $50 billion in operating cash flow in fiscal 2012,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s CFO during the Q4 2012 call. “Looking ahead to the first fiscal quarter of 2013, we expect revenue of about $52 billion and diluted earnings per share of about $11.75.”
For the fourth Quarter, Fortune had positioned overall revenue estimates from analysts at around $35.51 billion in revenue, with earnings of $8.75 EPS. Estimates had sited iPhone sales at roughly 26.42 million and iPad sales at around 17 million.
Apple sold 25.9 million iPhones in Q4, up 58% year over year, and 14 million iPads, up 26% year over year.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) on average, guesstimates its earnings and revenue to some extent lower than the actual. Financial analysts are all over the map, but lately the proletarians and independents have been more precise than the estimates of the professionals.
The company will hold a conference as it does always at 2p.m. to discuss the results with Wall Street analysts. The call will be run and answered by Apple CEO, Tim Cook, and CFO, Peter Oppenheimer.
