Apple Inc. has delivered surprisingly strong fiscal third-quarter earnings and signalled that its upcoming 10th anniversary phone line-up is on schedule, driving stock up six per cent to an all-time high in after-hours trading.
The stock climbed above its intraday record high to $159.10 after the company reported better-than-expected iPhone sales, revenue and earnings per share. The stock price move was expected to help drive the Dow Jones Industrial Average over the 22,000 mark yesterday.
Apple also said it hit a milestone of 1.2 billion iPhones sold. The April-June quarter is traditionally a soft one for Apple as the market waits for the September launch of new iPhone models.
The iPad product lines also showed unexpected strength
But this week’s results show that iPhone buyers may be less inclined than they once were to delay purchases until a new model is out.
The iPad product lines also showed unexpected strength, service revenue continues to grow at a healthy clip, and even the much maligned Apple Watch showed a 50 per cent sales increase.
Apple is widely tipped to adopt higher-resolution OLED displays for the latest iPhone, along with better touchscreen technology and wireless charging – which could come with a $1,000 plus price tag.
The phone is expected to launch in September.
The company forecast total revenue of between $49 billion and $52 billion for the current fourth quarter, while analysts on average were expecting $49.21 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Apple’s fourth quarter generally includes first-weekend sales of the company’s latest devices. The forecast “makes it fairly certain that at least some new iPhone models will be released on the normal schedule”, said analyst Jan Dawson of Jackdaw Research.
“That doesn’t necessarily mean all new models will go on sale then, or that they’ll all be in abundant supply, but I would think it means that at the very least the successors to the current phones will be available.”