AAPL falls victim to ‘overinflated expectations’

The Obvious But Hidden Secrets Behind Apple’s Record Numbers And Stock Price Crash | Mac360

Yes, I know. That’s absurd. And that’s how Wall Street works. What’s really broken with Apple? The company’s inability to surpass overinflated expectations. It’s as simple as that. Almost.

Revenue and profits are slowing down. They’re growing slower as a percentage over previous growth rates. Rates. Not actual numbers. Once a company hits $100-billion in annual revenue, growth of 20-percent requires another $20-billion in revenue in just a year. That kind of growth rate is difficult to maintain, regardless of how stellar the finances.

AAPL falls victim to ‘overinflated expectations’ | The Loop

Apple Confronts the Law of Large Numbers | NYTimes.com

If Apple’s share price grew even 20 percent a year for the next decade, which is far below its current blistering pace, its $500 billion market capitalization would be more than $3 trillion by 2022. That is bigger than the 2011 gross domestic product of France or Brazil.

Put another way, to increase its revenue by 20 percent, Apple has to generate additional sales of more than $9 billion in its next fourth quarter. A company with only $1 billion in sales has to come up with just another $200 million.

The Law of Large Numbers | Daring Fireball

The Apple paradox | Benedict Evans

As an investor, therefore, are you buying a company with high growth and continued high profits, slowing growth and the same high profits, or the same growth and (due to cheaper products) lower profit? It really isn’t clear. More cynically, this is a catch 22: high numbers mean saturation (bad), and low numbers mean slowing growth (bad).

Finally, Apple has got to the point where all news is bad news.

The Apple Paradox | Daring Fireball

With Apple, What A Difference A Week Makes

With Apple, What A Difference A Week Makes | TechCrunch

But there is a pretty simple way to explain one level of “disappointment” today — just as there was in Q4 of last year. While that was all about a shift in the iPhone release cycle (which led to the perfect storm that was Q1 2012 — which is directly related to this year — more below), this year was all about one week. One. Little. Week.

What Apple tried to alert everyone to multiple times over the past quarter, but few seemed to remember, is that Q1 2012 was an anomaly. It was 14 weeks long, versus the standard 13 weeks Apple uses to calculate a quarter. This year, things were back to normal: 13 weeks.

Just to beat the dead horse, … | MG Siegler ‏@parislemon

Just to beat the dead horse, last quarter: Microsoft revenues: $21.46 billion. iPhone revenues: $30.66 billion. Yes, just iPhone.

Ranking the analysts

Apple burned by analysts’ overheated expectations | Fortune Tech

Another way of looking at it is that Apple’s analysts did worse than the company this quarter, and the amateurs as a group did worse than the pros.

Ranking the analysts | The Loop

Tim Cook to Apple investors: Keep calm and stop listening to rumors

Tim Cook to Apple investors: Keep calm and stop listening to rumors | GigaOM

Despite the attempts to convince Wall Street analysts that Apple’s future remains bright, Cook’s explanations appear to have fallen on mostly deaf ears. As of the time of this posting, Apple investors have sent shares down more than 10 percent in afterhours trading to around $457.

Apple’s been on an incredible run but its investors are very nervous that boom years are coming to an end. It’s becoming clear that Apple can’t just go quietly about its business of selling iPhones, and this isn’t going to be the last time we hear Apple’s leaders have to make the case for the company’s success beyond what’s on the balance sheet.

Apple Posts Record iPhone Sales in Quarter | AllThingsD

The company topped its own forecast and sold a record 47 million iPhones, but nonetheless managed to disappoint: Shares were off more than 4 percent in after-hours trading following the numbers.

As is often the case, Apple’s outlook for the current quarter was less than some investors were hoping. The company said to expect revenue of $41 billion to $43 billion as opposed to the more than $45 billion that many analysts had been projecting.

Apple’s Q1 ’13: Misses at $54.5 rev, beats with $13.1B profit at $13.81 EPS, with 47.8M iPhones sold | The Next Web

Apple Reports Record Results

Apple Reports Record Results | Apple – Press Info

Apple today announced financial results for its 13-week fiscal 2013 first quarter ended December 29, 2012. The Company posted record quarterly revenue of $54.5 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.1 billion, or $13.81 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $46.3 billion and net profit of $13.1 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share, in the 14-week year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 38.6 percent compared to 44.7 percent in the year-ago quarter.

Average weekly revenue was $4.2 billion in the quarter compared to $3.3 billion in the year-ago quarter.

Apple Financial Results – Conference Call Q1 2013 | Apple

In his own words: Tim Cook on Apple earnings and more | Macworld

Apple reports record revenue and record $13.1 billion profit | The Loop

Apple Q1 2013 Quarterly Results | Daring Fireball

それでもアップル株は下がる・・・ | maclalala2