Apple Posts Best-Ever Third-Quarter Earnings

Apple posts best-ever third-quarter earnings on sales of more expensive iPhone X

Apple’s earnings for the most recent quarter reveal that the company is doing better than ever. Not only did it meet expectations, but it exceeded them too — and things are only likely to get better for Apple as it heads into another iPhone refresh cycle.

Generally speaking, the quarter ending June 30 is the slowest for Apple, at least when it comes to sales of the iPhone and Apple Watch. It’s right at the end of an iPhone’s lifetime — and right before a new set of iPhones take over. This year, however, Apple posted its strongest ever third-quarter earnings, beating expectations.

Apple also said during its earnings call that it expected revenue next quarter to be between $60 billion and $62 billion, which is again ahead of expectations from Wall Street — which come in at $59.47 billion. Meeting that estimate would put represent a hefty 15 percent increase over the same quarter last year.

In terms of units, Apple sold about as many iPhones as it did during the same quarter last year — 41.3 million. The difference this quarter, however, is that the average selling price of those iPhones was quite a bit higher, thanks to the more expensive iPhone X, which starts at $1,ooo.

Apple is also doing excellent in the wearables market. During the call, the company boasted about 60 percent growth in wearables, a segment that includes the Apple Watch, AirPods, and Beats headphones. It’s likely that segment will continue to grow — the Apple Watch is growing in popularity and AirPods have become a hit, too.

Apple is also growing its “services” category, which includes things like Apple Music, Apple Pay, Apple Care, iCloud, iTunes, and so on. Apple posted a hefty $9.55 billion in revenue for this category, which is up a hefty 28 percent from the same quarter a year ago. That segment also beat out Wall Street estimates, which came in at $9.21 billion. According to Apple, the boosted revenue is due to high Apple Pay usage, and an increase in paid subscribers through the App Store.

“Apple Pay continues to expand with well over 1 billion transactions last quarter, triple the amount from just a year ago, with growth accelerating from the March quarter,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook during the earnings call.

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