Apple has been reporting unit sales for its three biggest categories for years, but that will be coming to an end.
During the earnings call today, following the public earnings report for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2018, Apple confirmed that it will stop reporting unit sales starting in the first fiscal quarter of 2019. That will mark the start of Apple’s new financial year, so it looks like that will be the new precedent moving forward.
Part of the reasoning, according to Apple’s Chief Financial Officer, Luca Maestri, is due to the fact that “number of units sold in quarter is not representative of underlying state of business”. That determination has led Apple to decide to stop reporting unit sales for the three biggest revenue drives.
That is a huge shift on Apple’s part, especially in relation to the Wall Street investors who use these metrics to make assessments moving forward. It also marks, more than likely, a bigger focus on its Services category. Which would not be surprising, considering that particular category just marked itself its all time high of $10 billion in quarterly revenue all on its own.
Following along with its yearly routine, Apple today announced it latest quarterly earnings.
Apple has officially announced its third quarter results of 2018. These follow the strong results from the third quarter, and see millions more iPhones, iPads, and Macs sold to the masses. Here’s how it all breaks down:
Apple sold 46.89 million iPhones in the fourth fiscal quarter of this year, along with 9.69 million iPads. Meanwhile, Apple also sold 5.3 million Macs in the same stretch of time.
In total, the company earned $62.9 billion in total revenue in the quarter, and $14.12 billion in total profit.
“Apple today announced financial results for its fiscal 2018 fourth quarter ended September 29, 2018. The Company posted quarterly revenue of $62.9 billion, an increase of 20 percent from the year-ago quarter, and quarterly earnings per diluted share of $2.91, up 41 percent. International sales accounted for 61 percent of the quarter’s revenue.”
As is par for the course, Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, praised the strong quarter:
“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 Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Over the past two months, we’ve delivered huge advancements for our customers through new versions of iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad and Mac as well as our four operating systems, and we enter the holiday season with our strongest lineup of products and services ever.”
Apple’s Chief Financial Officer, Luca Maestri, also chimed in:
“We concluded a record year with our best September quarter ever, growing double digits in every geographic segment. We set September quarter revenue records for iPhone and Wearables and all-time quarterly records for Services and Mac,” said Luca Maestri, Apple’s CFO. “We generated $19.5 billion in operating cash flow and returned over $23 billion to shareholders in dividends and share repurchases in the September quarter, bringing total capital returned in fiscal 2018 to almost $90 billion.”
To compare year-over-year, Apple earned $52.6 billion in revenue, on the back of 46.7 million iPhones, 10.3 million iPads, and 5.4 million Macs sold in the fourth quarter of 2017.
Finally, Apple is providing the following guidance for its fiscal 2018 fourth quarter:
revenue between $89 billion and $93 billion
gross margin between 38 percent and 38.5 percent
operating expenses between $8.7 billion and $8.8 billion
other income/(expense) of $300 million
tax rate of approximately 16.5 percent before discrete items
