Apple Posts Strong Q4 Earnings Beat, iPhone Sales Miss Expectations

Just this week, Apple Inc. AAPL unveiled its newest line of products, including an upgraded MacBook Air, Mac Mini and iPad Pro.

Despite the plateau of iPhones sales over time, the move towards Apple’s most expensive product line seems to be paying off, as Apple reported earnings of $2.91 per share, beating estimates of $2.78.

Q4 Highlights

• Sales totaled $62.9 billion, which beat estimates of $61.48 billion by 2.31 percent. This represented an increase of 21.1 percent from Q4 2017.
• iPhone unit sales totaled 46.9 million, which increased 29 percent year-over-yea but slightly missed analysts expectations of 47.5 million.
• The average selling price (ASP) of the iPhone is $793, up from $617.99 a year ago.
• iPad unit sales amounted to 9.69 million, down 6 percent year-over-year.
• Mac unit sales were 5.29 million, down 2 percent year-over-year.
• Q4 unit sales increased 20 percent year-over-year, or 18 percent sequentially.

Apple sees Q1 sales in a range of $89-$93 billion against a $92.91 billion estimate. The company sees Q1 gross margin 38-38.5 percent.

“We’re thrilled to report another record-breaking quarter that caps a tremendous fiscal 2018, the year in which we shipped our 2 billionth iOS device, celebrated the 10th anniversary of the App Store and achieved the strongest revenue and earnings in Apple’s history,” said CEO Tim Cook. “[W]e enter the holiday season with our strongest lineup of products and services ever.”

Apple shares closed up 1.54 percent at $222.22. Shares were down about 3.7 percent in after-hours trading.

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