Apple to report Q3 2017 earnings on Aug. 1
Apple on Wednesday announced it will on Aug. 1 reveal quarterly earnings for the third fiscal quarter of 2017, traditionally the slowest sales period of the year for the tech giant.
Announced through Apple's Investor Relations webpage, the upcoming earnings report is to be followed by a live-streamed conference call Tuesday, Aug. 1, at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern. As usual, Apple CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri are expected to provide commentary on the performance metrics and field questions from investment analysts.
For the third quarter, Apple is looking to return iPhone to year-over-year growth after a string of quarterly dips. The lucrative holiday shopping season saw iPhone sales return to growth at the end of 2016, but the progress was short lived as sales slumped in the second quarter of 2017.
Bolstering Apple revenue during iPhone's recent sales fluctuations was services. The sector, which for Apple includes Apple Music, iCloud, iTunes and App Stores, has steadily grown over the past year and was up 18 percent during the second fiscal quarter of 2017.
Apple is guiding for revenue between $43.5 billion and $45.5 billion with a gross margin between 37.5 percent and 38.5 percent for the third fiscal quarter of 2017. Operating expenses are expected to come in between $6.6 billion and $6.7 billion. If Apple manages to reach those estimates, it will outperform on a year-over-year basis.
AppleInsider will provide live coverage of Apple's conference call for the third quarter on Tuesday, Aug. 1, starting at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern.
Announced through Apple's Investor Relations webpage, the upcoming earnings report is to be followed by a live-streamed conference call Tuesday, Aug. 1, at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern. As usual, Apple CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri are expected to provide commentary on the performance metrics and field questions from investment analysts.
For the third quarter, Apple is looking to return iPhone to year-over-year growth after a string of quarterly dips. The lucrative holiday shopping season saw iPhone sales return to growth at the end of 2016, but the progress was short lived as sales slumped in the second quarter of 2017.
Bolstering Apple revenue during iPhone's recent sales fluctuations was services. The sector, which for Apple includes Apple Music, iCloud, iTunes and App Stores, has steadily grown over the past year and was up 18 percent during the second fiscal quarter of 2017.
Apple is guiding for revenue between $43.5 billion and $45.5 billion with a gross margin between 37.5 percent and 38.5 percent for the third fiscal quarter of 2017. Operating expenses are expected to come in between $6.6 billion and $6.7 billion. If Apple manages to reach those estimates, it will outperform on a year-over-year basis.
AppleInsider will provide live coverage of Apple's conference call for the third quarter on Tuesday, Aug. 1, starting at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern.
Comments
Au Contraire. Apple revenue did dip in the March quarter, but that is the norm. Since FY2013 March quarter revenue has declined from December quarter levels an average of 26.4%. That said March quarter 2017 saw revenue INCREASE 4.63% over the same period in 2016.
After suffering 3 consecutive quarters of negative growth in 2016, Apple is on the verge of reporting 3 consecutive quarters of YoY growth, The September quarter should make that 4 consecutive quarters, with FY2018 extending that growth trend to 8 consecutive quarters.
On a sell-in basis, iPhone unit sales were down a little YoY in the second quarter. Revenue from iPhones was up a little and unit sales were up a little on a sell-through basis. But the number that is most often reported is the sell-in number, which was down some.
In all seriousness, I think this is going to be an awesome year for Apple in both financial gain and products. Can't wait for what's ahead!
Seriously though, they could go full-Microsoft for the next decade and it would still be two more decades before they stop paying the gardeners. A lot of us have been using their technology since the last time that almost happened, though there were some defections...
It's Apple earnings time. Let's run the mind experiment again. Maybe some analyst somewhere will finally gain some perspective.
Apple Mind Experiment
A mind experiment that should be performed by these analysts who see themselves as capable of running the show better than Cook would be to imagine the company as merely a black box. Inside the box, out of sight and unnamed, resides a management team. The company makes some products and plays in some markets, of which you are not aware. You also don’t see the stock price. And you aren’t aware that there was a CEO who died and was replaced with another member of the management team.
The only information you’re given is the financial metrics, total revenues and profits, cash and cash equivalents, etc, but nothing about the stock performance, with the provided financial numbers presented for each of the last five years. Next to this information you are given the same information about other companies. You don’t know that these other companies are Google and Amazon, or take your pick of companies to compare against.
Your job is to determine, with just the pertinent business metrics you’ve been handed, which company you would want to own a portion of; company X (AAPL), company Y (GOOGL), or company Z (AMZN).
Pretty sure most would laugh company Z right out of the competition.
And you’d likely think of company X that it must have some pretty great management and must be in some great lines of business, which go together, as it’s management that determines what businesses a company plays in. You’d think whomever these guys are, the decisions they made over the five years, whether some were mistakes and others were great, in aggregate turned out pretty darned well. And it’s therefore likely this same management is making good decisions today and will continue to do so in the future, with vastly more information and expertise in their field than those outside the company who so easily second-guess them.
This is the mind experiment I want Wall St. to run through its collective skull.
Now imagine if Apple forced the issue by ending its reporting of unit sales numbers for individual products. If the company reported revenue in three categories (hardware, software, services) and total profit and gross margins for the entire company, not broken out. The stock might take an initial huge hit (which the company could take advantage of with a big buyback sweep) but after things settle down the analysts would be forced to focus their attention on what’s actually important about a business; how, in aggregate, through whatever set of decisions management has made, the company is doing in terms of revenues and earnings. Would Apple still get a multiple in the teens versus the 26x multiple assigned to CLX, a maker of bleach? Or the 27x multiple assigned to KO, a maker of soft drinks. By the way, something on the order of 80-90% of the population of the world who’s ever going to drink soft drinks already does, and so KO and PEP are in exactly the position the analysts dread Apple to be in; they are reliant upon repeat annual consumption by existing customers and their ability to convert customers from the competition’s brand. And yet, there it is, a 27+ multiple on KO. So if you want to really address what the fanboys are all about, you’ll run the mind experiment and then address these comparisons.
So many articles about Apple's earnings refer to growth, and mention prominently any decline in growth, and attribute that to saturated markets. That's fine, big companies have declining growth rates in saturated markets. The trouble is, a leveling out for Apple, versus any other maturing company on the planet, somehow in analyst's minds implies the end of the company. They believe, for some reason, that ongoing replacement sales and capturing customers from the competition are unworthy of any multiple on the stock. They must think the company in this scenario is worth zero, because not one of them will put forth a reasoned valuation relative to other businesses whose business has leveled off after a period of growth. BMW still sells cars at premium prices even in a world automobile market that isn't growing at the rate Apple's markets are still growing. Coach and other high-end fashion products companies still sell their wares at premium prices even in a world where functionally equivalent handbags sell at $40 at the local Sears. But they seem to believe they can second guess the future of Apple. And then they attribute to us investors all the wrong motivations for our angst. It's not about whether we think the iPad should have, or shouldn't have a USB port; it's that we see a very viable and valuable business, one that any of Apple's competitors would jump to switch places with, and we see that the value of that business and its future prospects are given short shrift by the very community (analysts) who are supposed to shed light on the topic.
I'm sure that there are people who make a very decent living shorting Apple.
Logic be dammed. Microsoft is a darling and Apple is not. Pure and simple really.
I bought my first lot of APPL stock in 2003. The broker asked "Why? They are going nowhere. They only appeal to geeks." I don't see much difference today. Despite the profits and the shareholder value Wall St hates APPL. IMHO, Apple should move domicile to somewhere that appreciates them a bit more.