Earnings Preview: Wall Street expects solid quarter from Apple, but focus is on the fall
While many Apple observers expect the company to reveal solid year-over-year growth for its relatively quiet June quarter, much of the focus will be on new CFO Luca Maestri's guidance for the fall with updated iPhones and iPads on the horizon, the expected closing of the Beats acquisition, and the possibility of a so-called "iWatch."
Cowen & Co.'s Timothy Arcuri was bullish on Apple's prospects in a Monday morning note to investors, predicting that the Cupertino, Calif.-based company would beat the Wall Street consensus. The bank expects earnings per share of $1.17 on revenue of $36.6 billion, compared to $35.4 billion one year ago.
Arcuri believes Apple may have sold as many as 38 million iPhones thanks to "tepid demand" for competitors like Samsung's Galaxy S5 and the increasing availability of high-speed LTE wireless connections in growth markets, including mainland China. In contrast, the 12.5 million iPads Apple is thought to have sold through June would represent a modest drop from the 14.6 million tablets the company shipped in the year-ago quarter.
Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster, meanwhile, sees sales of 35 million to 36 million iPhones and 14 million to 15 million driving revenue of $38 billion, a 7 percent year-over-year increase.
Both analysts are looking to Apple's September guidance for evidence of the company's launch schedule for its next-generation products. A late September launch for the so-called "iPhone 6" could mean a boost of as much as $2 billion to Apple's revenues for the quarter, Munster believes, driving them as high as $41 billion.
Other topics analysts are sure to press Cook and Maestri on include Apple's $3 billion acquisition of Beats -- which Cook previously said would be accretive to revenues in the fourth quarter -- and the effectiveness of its recent 7-for-1 stock split. The company's new enterprise partnership with computing giant IBM is also likely to be on the docket.
AppleInsider will provide live coverage of Apple's earnings call for the company's fiscal third quarter -- the company's first with Maestri at the helm -- on July 22.
Cowen & Co.'s Timothy Arcuri was bullish on Apple's prospects in a Monday morning note to investors, predicting that the Cupertino, Calif.-based company would beat the Wall Street consensus. The bank expects earnings per share of $1.17 on revenue of $36.6 billion, compared to $35.4 billion one year ago.
Arcuri believes Apple may have sold as many as 38 million iPhones thanks to "tepid demand" for competitors like Samsung's Galaxy S5 and the increasing availability of high-speed LTE wireless connections in growth markets, including mainland China. In contrast, the 12.5 million iPads Apple is thought to have sold through June would represent a modest drop from the 14.6 million tablets the company shipped in the year-ago quarter.
Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster, meanwhile, sees sales of 35 million to 36 million iPhones and 14 million to 15 million driving revenue of $38 billion, a 7 percent year-over-year increase.
Both analysts are looking to Apple's September guidance for evidence of the company's launch schedule for its next-generation products. A late September launch for the so-called "iPhone 6" could mean a boost of as much as $2 billion to Apple's revenues for the quarter, Munster believes, driving them as high as $41 billion.
Other topics analysts are sure to press Cook and Maestri on include Apple's $3 billion acquisition of Beats -- which Cook previously said would be accretive to revenues in the fourth quarter -- and the effectiveness of its recent 7-for-1 stock split. The company's new enterprise partnership with computing giant IBM is also likely to be on the docket.
AppleInsider will provide live coverage of Apple's earnings call for the company's fiscal third quarter -- the company's first with Maestri at the helm -- on July 22.
Comments
Best first post ever ...
New product lines are not guaranteed to succeed, even from Apple. When John Sculley took over from Steve, his first entirely new product line was the Newton Message Pad. It flopped and he got the axe.
You are funny.
I'd guess zero.
You are funny.
Doesn't the (rumored) iWatch concept feel vaguely PDA-ish to you?
The original Newton promised futuristic handwriting recognition that never quite worked. The iWatch promises futuristic speech recognition that...
This Q (2Q calendar 2914, apple's fisca 3Q, china overtakes Europe and the u.s. in iPhone sales.
The analysts will of course turn this into a negative and say that because the5S is still selling, there will be less upgrades for the iPhone 6.
Wow, you even found a way to make it funny!
Although I think this post is the best I ever saw. In order to 'appreciate it' one does need to read the article, or skim through it:
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2010/07/07/how-to-speed-up-your-iphone-3g-running-ios4/#more-4367
Doesn't the (rumored) iWatch concept feel vaguely PDA-ish to you?
The original Newton promised futuristic handwriting recognition that never quite worked.
You really are funny. Did you know that there hasn't been a HWR system developed that beats what Apple put into Newton OS 2.1 (the final revision)? Galaxy Note reviews have compared, it still can't match the Newton.
Does anyone know if the Chinese character recognition on the iPhone is any good/useful for the Chinese?
I wonder if the average Murderers' Row analyst will take into account (going forward) the presence of that new board member as influential to the stock price?
Since they seemingly don't do it to other companies, they probably won't do it to Apple either.
Just a guess.
How is this possible when Apple hasn't updated anything since becoming CEO.
Maestri's the CFO, not CEO.
The note is about Maestri's guidance for the upcoming quarter(s) with the assumption that there will be an updated lineup of iPhones and iPads during the time frame in question.
Apple will give some basic guidance in terms of revenue, EPS, etc. but won't give specifics on the exact nature of product line changes.
Is this the first time you've paid attention to a fiscal earnings announcement from any publicly-traded company?
I'm not talking about Maestri.
Well, the article is.
The CFO often takes the helm during earnings announcements, not just at Apple, but many other companies as well.
I see he removed 'Cook' from your quote, I hate that when people edit what someone posts then make some snarky reply to the now totally different meaning.
He quoted exactly what I wrote. I edited my comment after I read his reply to make my comment more clear.