Mikey Campbell
Apple on Monday announced it will report quarterly earnings for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2016 on Oct. 27, to be followed by a live-streamed conference call on Apple's investor website.
The company posted details of the upcoming live stream on Investor Relations webpage earlier today, saying live stream kicks off on Thursday, Oct. 27 at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern. As usual, CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri are expected to attend the conference call.
For the three-month period ending in September, Apple is looking to stabilize the first-ever contraction in iPhone demand dating back to the April quarter. During the most recent fiscal quarter, the company shored up financials breakwaters on the back of iPhone SE, a device credited in part with wooing the highest level of iPhone switchers in company history. Other hardware segments helped make up for lost iPhone growth, with iPad seeing its best result year-over-year compare in ten quarters.
In addition, Apple's services segment continued to expand last quarter, with revenue from offerings like Apple Music, iCloud, iTunes and the various App Stores up 19 percent from the same time last year. Speaking to investors in quarter three, Cook said he expects services to be the size of a Fortune 100 company by 2017.
Apple is guiding for revenue between $45.5 billion and $47.5 billion, and gross margin between 37.5 percent and 38 percent for the fourth quarter of 2016. Operating expenses are expected to fall between $6.05 billion and $6.15 billion, with other income of $350 million. The company expects a tax rate of 25.5 percent.
Early analyst consensus sees an uptick in iPhone orders leading into the lucrative holiday season, though KGI analyst Ming-Chi Kuo believes the recently released iPhone 7 will not perform as well as iPhone 6s. Supply constraints are partially to blame, as consumers appear to be leaning toward iPhone 7 Plus and jet black models, both of which are suffering from long manufacturing lead times.
AppleInsider will be cover Apple's conference call for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2016 live on Thursday, Oct. 27, starting at 2 p.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. Eastern.
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
AppleInsider Staff
Chip Loder
Malcolm Owen
9 Comments
That date will give plenty of time for the analysts and financial pundits to publish articles and work up schemes as to why Apple isn't going to meet expectations. The Apple bulls talk about all the disparate parts of Apple coming together to form some sort of value foundation. But the only thing Wall Street is really concerned with is how many iPhones are being sold. Being a one-trick pony works well for Alphabet but doesn't work at all for Apple. I think the iPhone has actually become a stumbling block for Apple that can't be replaced with anything else Apple does. Which hurts Apple the most? Low demand or low supply. It seems as though both are harmful for Apple's share price. How can any company balance that perfectly so that supply precisely matches demand at all times? When it comes to many tens of millions of units of a high-quality product, I wouldn't think it would be possible.
For anyone who wants a good laugh...
http://www.theverge.com/2016/9/26/13063738/apple-iphone-7-headphone-jack-internet-access-low-income-households#comments
When is the next dividend date? I always like seeing those deposits into my account.