“Apple will report second quarter earnings on Tuesday, and Microsoft will follow on Thursday,” Zaky writes. “Though Apple still has a ways to go to compete with Microsoft in terms of net income due to Microsoft’s untouchable operating margin, many will be surprised to discover that Apple’s revenues are close to surpassing Microsoft’s. If it doesn’t happen this week, it will almost certainly come in the next quarterly announcement.”
Zaky writes, “Financial Alchemist’s Turley Muller, who is currently the most accurate analyst on Apple… believes that Apple will report about $3.1 billion in net income on ($3.35 in EPS) on $15.15 billion in revenue… Microsoft, on the other hand, is expected to earn $4.1 billion in net income ($0.46 in EPS) on $15.26 billion in revenue when it releases results on Thursday – just a hair above Muller’s revenue estimates for Apple. And while Microsoft regularly reports upside surprises itself, the gap between consensus estimates and Microsoft’s actual results is nowhere near as wide as it is with Apple’s results.”
Read more in the full article here.
Little good this is doing AAPL right now. Shares are down right now. Will the dim-witted please sit down and shut-up and stop being hysterical about the freaking antenna. I can now make calls with the iPhone 4 in places I normally couldn’t with the 3GS, so what’s the fraking problem?
Bet you they report at least 3.88 in eps on 7.5 million iPhones. If they report 9.5 million iPhones eps will be at least 4.48.
Buying opportunity. Nothing else. Apple is after HP right now.
It will happen this year. All the products sell better than ever.
Well, this latest dip may allow MSFT to pass Apple. Apple is now $220.5B at 10:40am, while MSFT is at $220.0B.
Will this mean I get my iPhone quicker?
“Whether it deserves it or not, Apple has held onto its lead over Microsoft in terms of market capitalization since it first surpassed it back in May…”
——————
As the character Will Munny stated in “Unforgiven,” — “Deserve’s got nothin’ to do with it…”
Market cap is a reflection of the demand (or lack thereof) for a company’s publicly-traded shares. While the market sentiment may be capricious or irrational at times, it generally is rooted in some tangible, factual basis. Here, that basis is Apple’s strong balance sheet, undeniable demand for its products and a growing acknowledgment that the company is in the pole position to dominate the mobile computing game with an array of well-designed devices that complement each other and are appreciated by the consumer.
By the same token, Microsoft’s stock price has languished as investors sense that the company has — inexplicably and against all odds — totally failed to leverage its giant resources and desktop domination into a relevant presence in the mobile game, thanks to managerial infighting and the lack of a focused strategy and compelling products (not to mention a viable OS). So, while Microsoft cash registers will continue to ring, thanks to its desktop OS sales and Office, it has been relegated to also-ran status in the mobile game, where the lion’s share of future computing revenue lies. Market cap reflects all of these things, so there is nothing capricious about it, in this case.
“Whether it deserves it or not, Apple …”
lol, what a fine piece of non-editorializing journalism! jeez, what a joke.
Three fellows have called me to crow about MS market cap back above AAPL. I wish I could have been a little more modest when I crowed about Apple passing MS a while ago. My broker says his shop has AAPL going down to $215. Ouch. Pride goeth before a fall?
“Whether it deserves it or not, “
Lost credibility with that line. Go back to journalism school, leave your opinions out.
MS fanboys who don’t get finance think this is really important. When Apple passed them in marketcap, Wall Street told the world who’s running the show this generation: iPad.
I’ve said it before but I’m hoping for around $5 EPS, new macbooks, iPad and iPhone 4 sales should see to this. Q2 results blew the analysts out of the water I expect Q3 to be the same.
@hughb
Day-to-day fluctuations in the stock price are to be expected. Think about the long term prospects for these respective companies, where Apple is undeniably in a more enviable position. Microsoft will continue to milk Office and Windows desktop for as long as possible, but its glory days of acting like the schoolyard bully are over.
Apple, barring some earth-shattering, self-inflicted screw-up (and I don’t mean this overblown, media-driven iPhone antenna nonsense), or a major asteroid impact on Cupertino, is going to be the pack leader in mobile computing. Microsoft is not going to be able to turn it around with Windows Phone 7 Series (or whatever convoluted name they changed it to). Too little, too late. They’ve had how long to perfect this thing and it won’t have copy and paste or multi-tasking? In late 2010? Un-frickin’ believable. What will Windows Phone 7 offer the every-day consumer that iOS or Droid or WebOS won’t? There’s no compelling case for the product, because there are so many well-made products in the market already.
Ballmer is fixated on selling mobile licenses — the MS sales model of the desktop. This means melding Microsoft’s mediocre software to equally mediocre hardware (with the inevitable warts that such a marriage provides). I would give MS a fighting chance in mobile if Ballmer had the stones to direct MS to come out with its own hardware for a phone — but he can’t do it — he’s so averse to taking the risk of meddling with hardware (and probably too lazy to deal with the meticulous detail required to make hardware) — which is why MS will never dominate mobile — This isn’t the desktop game, where consumers tolerated Windows mediocrity as the tax for cheap hardware. Sure, a few die-hard Microsoft fans will drool over WIndows Phone, but there is no way it will gain deep market penetration. Microsoft will be lucky to take away 5% of the smartphone market, and I think even that is overly optimistic.
@Jubei – If you read the whole article you would notice that the author is actually positive on Apple but simply had to point out that there’s a debate as to whether Apple should hold a market cap above Microsoft. He then goes on to say, that Apple probably should have a larger market.
Go back to grade school learn to read before jumping to criticism.
“Whether it deserves it or not…”
This isn’t how I originally stated it, and its part of the reason why there’s a love-hate relationship between editors and authors. I’m stuck having to defend a sentence I didn’t write. What’s interesting is that almost every time I’ve been criticized for a title or a statement, its come from an editor. While I don’t mind getting absolutely slammed for sentences I’ve written, I hate having to defend a view I didn’t articulate myself. Here’s the original sentence edited out:
“While doubts as to whether Apple (AAPL) deserves to hold the second largest market cap in the U.S. over Microsoft (MSFT) continues to mount, one thing it is clear: Apple is rapidly closing the revenue gap on Microsoft. Though Apple still has a ways to go to compete with Microsoft in terms of net income due to Microsoft’s untouchable operating margin, many will be surprised to discover that Apple is significantly closer to surpassing Microsoft in revenue than the average investor might believe.”
~Andy
Hey Andy,
Your original version of the headline was much better — both in terms of coherence and clarity — and because the word “deserves” doesn’t really make sense in that context. Amazing that editors often possess worse grammatical/phrasing skills than the people whose writing they are supposed to refine and improve…
Anyway, I salute you for exercising your right to semantic self-defense and coming out here to set the record straight. The reasonable folks among us understand that writers often do have their words changed after the fact by less-than-savvy editors.
Cheers
Thanks Doug.
~Andy
“Whether it deserves it or not, Apple has held onto its lead over Microsoft…”
Anti-Apple FUD lives on forever. Luddites abound. Trolliness is next to Tardiness. On and on. Yawn and zzzzzzz.
Ok,
$3.51 EPS
$15.7 Billion in Revenue
$3.25 Billion in Net Profit
What you got MSFT?