http://www.macworld.com/article/131754/200...leearnings.htmlQUOTE
In reporting its $1.58 billion profit, Apple said it shipped 2,319,000 Macs, representing 44-percent unit growth and 47-percent revenue growth over the year-ago quarter. Sales of Mac hardware, software, and services made up 47 percent of Apple’s total quarterly revenue.
Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer described Mac sales as “very robust” with desktop sales seeing 53-percent year-over-year growth, fueled by the revamped iMacs Apple introduced in August. Sales of portable Macs rose 38 percent from the year-ago quarter.
“The Macintosh business is on fire,” Apple chief operating officer Tim Cook told analysts during a conference call to discuss the company’s earnings.
Apple reported $170 million in revenue from its Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard update, released in October. Oppenheimer described that figure as a “significant increase” from the $100 million in sales OS X 10.4 saw during the first quarter of its release. The company estimates that 19 percent of its installed base is already using the 10.5 update.
Interesting - in just over two months, Leopard has managed an adoption rate exceeding that of Windows Vista (reported at 14% on PCWorld's Techblog stats in early January) which has been out for almost a year.
However, despite all that GOOD news, guess what? (and this really illustrates the complete wackiness of the stock market/analysis silliness):
QUOTE
Stocks fell in another rocky opening Wednesday, with investors uneasy about the health of the economy and corporate earnings after disappointing reports from big names like Apple Inc. (AAPL) and Motorola Inc. (MOT) In the first minutes of trading, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 261.10, or 2.18 percent, to 11,710.09.....
Meanwhile, a disappointing forecast from Apple showed how fragile investor sentiment is.
The maker of the iPod issued a forecast for its fiscal second quarter that said sales would likely grow by 29 percent. The figure would represent faster growth than in earlier years but fell short of what Wall Street had expected.
Apple's expectations appeared to confirm worries about consumer spending. As consumers account for more than two-thirds of the economy, investors are keen on learning whether retailers and other companies will have a harder time prying open wallets.
Shares of Apple fell more than 10 percent in early trading.
It's not the market that's fragile, but people's common sense (and memory). Apple has a long history of low-balling future earnings estimates:
Apple low-balled outlook – again
