“With just about two weeks to go until technology giant Apple reports its fiscal second quarter, everyone is starting to get their estimates together,” Bill Maurer writes for Seeking Alpha. “Since management decided to stop reporting unit sales, some of the numbers seem a little harder to predict.”
“As we move into the summer months, Apple enters a traditional weaker time of the year. Generally speaking, iPhone sales decline before a new line of phones launches in September, and other products with a similar launch timeline see the same pattern,” Maurer writes. “Overall revenues have declined by an average of $8 billion from the March to June quarters over the past four years.”
“he street is looking for $57.51 billion in the March quarter,” Maurer writes. “The March period estimate is currently half a billion dollars above Apple’s guidance midpoint of $55 billion to $59 billion for the period.”
“The big question here is what will investors really focus on the most? Let’s hypothetically say that history repeats and guidance is below expectations as I’ve detailed it could be,” Maurer writes. “Will that potential news be offset by a potentially large dividend raise as well as an increase to the buyback that we should see at this report?”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: A strong capital return program update (buybacks and dividends) would go a long way towards assuaging any “disappointment(s)” in Q219 earnings due to be revealed on Tuesday, April 30, 2019 after market close.
His name is Tim Cook calling him history is a bit premature at this time.
If I recall correctly, the buyback program and dividend increase will be set at the board meeting in May.
But they make the proposal with the Q2 earnings report, and such a proposal rarely ever gets amended. Never in case of Apple.