MacDailyNews presents live notes from Apple’s Q312 Conference Call with analysts starting at 5pm EDT/2pm PDT today.
Live notes from Apple’s Q312 Conference Call in reverse chronological order:
• End of conference call.
• Cook: We’ll never stop Apple product rumors / product speculation. I’m glad there is so much interest in Apple products.
• Cook: In these economic periods, where we separate ourselves is by making the best products in the world as opposed to those who do not innovate
• Cook reiterates: “Our North Star is to manically focus on making the very best products.”
• Cook: New iPad ended quarter just over 4 week line in target 4-6 week inventory. Addition of China may challenge supply/demand balance
• Cook: We have been short with MacBook Pro with Retina displays supplies; look to supply/demand balance in August
• Cook: I love India, but I believe that Apple has some higher potential in the intermediate term in some other countries. We are growing in India, but the multi-layer distribution there really adds to the cost of the products.
• Cook: Adoption rate of iPad in education is something I have never seen in any product in history
• Passbook app a precursor to a digital wallet? Cook: No comment. Won’t speculate on where it might take us
• Cook: We are believers in Apple TV and we continue to invest in it. 4 million units is not a small number.
• Cook: Apple TV sold 1.3 million units in Q312, up over 170% YOY; 4 million units sold in fiscal 2012, so far. Still at a level Apple calls “a hobby.”
• 5:45PM EDT: AAPL After Hours: $570.45, -$30.47 (5.07%)
• Cook: We’ve all seen many different tablets and I have yet to see any of them gain what I would call any level of traction so far; most customers feel they’re not looking for a tablet, they’re looking for an iPad. Over 84 million iPads sold in total by end of quarter. 17 million sold in quarter is up 84% YOY
• The $399 iPad 2 did very well. Particularly key in the education K-12 market where it sold about 1 million units in the quarter
• Cook: Channel inventory figures are only for indirect sales; does not include Apple Store online or Apple Retail Stores.
• Cook: Our North Star for the company is to make the very best product and thats more important and overshadows everything.
• Cook: We’re going to stick to our knitting and make the very best products
• Cook: We see China as an enormous opportunity. We grew iPhone sales over 100% in China.
• Oppy: Did not get the benefit of launching new iPad or new Mac portables in CHina during the quarter
• Oppy: Timing of Mac portable release came very late in the quarter
• Oppy: Economy in Europe not doing well; this negatively affected our results
• Oppy: Give what’s going on around us, we’re happy with our quarter. All product lines exceeded what we had factored into our guidance.
• Cook: Carrier tell me that iPhone has many advantages: Churn rate is much less, customers more likely to have a tablet and use shared data plans, iPhone is most data efficient smartphone on the market.
• Cook: We are manically focused on making the very best products in the world
• Cook: Carriers want to provide their customers with what their customers want to buy
• Cook: I will avoid talking about the “product transition.” Our role is to make the very best smartphone in the world
• Cook: 25th consecutive quarter of Mac growing faster than the PC market
• Cook: It’s clear the PC market is weak. Primary factor for lower Mac growth in Q312 is timing of new Mac portable lineup launch with less than 3 weeks remaining in the quarter
• Cook: Incredible anticipation out there for future products, as you would expect given what we have been able to deliver in the past
• Oppy: We could not be happier with our product pipeline.
• Oppy: “Fall transition” is driving most of the decline that we are forecasting in gross margin
• Cook: Europe did not do well which impacted Apple overall results; Greece, etc. especially poor
• Cook: In comparing fiscal Q2 iPhone sales vs. Q3 there is a fairly large channel inventory difference of about 3 million units
• Oppy: “Very successful” iPad 2 at $399 (did not exist in YOY quarter) will impact the ASP of the iPad line
• Oppy: Weekly iPhone sales continue to be impacted by rumors of next-gen iPhone
• Fiscal Q412 guidance is up 20% YOY. Apple not expecting economies in Europe, Brazil, Canada to improve in fiscal Q412
• Cook: We remain really confident and very excited about opportunities in China, including China-specific features
• Cook: New iPad sales not launched during Q312 – just launched recently
• Cook: Up over 100% YOY in iPhone unit sales in China
• Apple did not see anything they would attribute to the economy in China
• $2.2 billion sequential revenue decline due to iPhone unit sales in China (last quarter iPhone launched in China) and normal seasonality
• Tim Cook: 25% growth in Asia/Pacific; greater China represents about 2/3rds of Asia/Pacific
• Oppy: Apple has amazing new products in the pipeline that they will discuss at a later date
• Apple posted their best quarter ever for U.S. education
• $10 billion share buyback to take place over 3 year period and starts on September 30, 2012
• Cash hoard: $117.2 billion, +$7 billion vs. last quarter, $81 billion of which is offshore
• 372 Apple Retail Stores now open.
• Apple Retail Stores: 83 million visitors
• Apple Retail Stores: $4.1 billion revenue.
• 410 million iOS devices sold total all-time, over 45 million iOS units sold in Q312 quarter alone
• Record Mac sales to education; iPad sold just under 1 million units to education, double that of Mac (500,000 units)
• Apple iPad now sold in 97 countries
• 5:07PM EDT: AAPL After Hours: $570.30, -$30.62 (5.10%)
• 14 million downloads of new iTunes U app
• iTunes Store: Over $1.8 billion revenue
• iPod touch continues to account for 50% of total iPod sales
• Apple will release OS X Mountain Lion tomorrow
• Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer guidance: “Revenue of about $34 billion and diluted earnings per share of about $7.65”
• Dividend payable on August 16, 2012 to stockholders of record as of the close of business on August 13, 2012
• Apple’s Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share
• IDC had estimated a 1% contraction of Mac unit sales. Whoops.
• Mac units sold: 4.0 million (+2% YOY)
• iPod units sold: 6.8 million (-10% YOY)
• iPad units sold: 17.0 million (+84% YOY)
• iPhone units sold: 26.0 million (+28% YOY)
• International sales accounted for 62% of the quarter’s revenue
• Gross margin was 42.8 percent compared to 41.7% in the year-ago quarter
• Apple’s highest Q3 revenue and EPS ever.
• Versus revenue of $28.6 billion and net profit of $7.3 billion, or $7.79 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter
• Quarterly net profit of $8.8 billion or $9.32 per diluted share
• Quarterly revenue of $35.0 billion
• Apple’s fiscal 2012 third quarter ended June 30, 2012
• 4:45PM EDT: AAPL After Hours: $571.37, -$29.55 (4.92%)
Looks like another joyous buying opportunity while the idiots overreact.
hugely overreact!!!
Hugely, hugely, hugely overreact.
the Market ANAL-ysts should all be shot, they just don’t see AAPL, the stock in AfterHours reached $566 from $604.
for 4 years now these f’g idiot just don’t get it.
the very odd things is they do NOT judge any other co. like Apple!!?!
Apple is the only one in the Black for all these years.
Apple is the only one that changes things forward in evolution, not backwards.
Apple is the only one spending Billions in R&D, whilst the rest don’t think, copy, don’t spend.
no other firm is always in the Black, just as in this Quarterly earnings report again, and for the longest quarters in a row in human history, yet it’s NEVER good enough for those f’g analysts! ALL other firms do much worse, are even in the red, yet they don’t judge them with the same regard, principles, rules as Apple?!
this means they totally manipulate Apple as everyone knows. but how long are we going to keep those wholes employed at salaries they never deserve?! what is the point of analysts except their self-fulfilling prophecy of being as much jerks as lawyers & doctors?
i can see some commenting i exaggerate or have a chip on my shoulder. but hey, fact is fact. i am not manipulating the stock, you people and they are. if i’m so wrong, prove my points above wrong. how is it that AAPL is judged under different rules?!
I wish I had the money to buy more…gotta wait till pay day.
People are freaking out about the Mac numbers without realizing that the new lineup of MacBooks was on the market for all of two weeks of the quarter that was just reported.
Anal-lysts like to drive the stock down, then buy and profit off the bounce (either directly or indirectly via favored customers). All TOO EASY to do when your opinion can influence the market.
Been stock piling cash for the last couple months for this opportunity. About 3-4 months ago bought some at $540 and plan to buy more tomorrow morning. Wahoo!
Add that to what I already have an will be on record for those dividends, all good by me because I’m not going anywhere. This is the perfect time to buy for the next two quarters.
No complaints here. These so called “analysts” are so easy to predict so I just wait for them to reaction. This is not rocket science.
Sounds like you are an ANAList!
I don’t get paid to make up bullshit numbers. I just play the game and it’s my money not someone elses.
Call me what you want but I plan to retire at 55 and this “game” has paid for my childrens college, my house and cars.
I am debt free, how about you?
Apple’s highest Q3 rev + EPS! ever!!
yet ANALysts don’t get it.
pathetic!!
at this point:
1. analysts are dumb
2. they’re cheaters, manipulators
take you’re pick, they’re the worst human breed.
but the fda & gov. is just as responsible for allowing legal crime. because if this is what capitalism is all about, goodness help us be the fittest to survive – it ain’t working. we’re at a lost on every societal front, from economy, education, infrastructure, intelligence, culture, innovation, homelessness, famine, real estate, health care, to everything else.
it’s time to restart society. reboot our culture. reinvent the country as a startup, with agile intelligence, not normalcy & dormancy.
I noticed the bullet point indicating Mountain Lion’s release on tomorrow (Wednesday). Is there any indication as to what time of day it is expected to be available in the App Store? I can only imagine the mad rush and long download times as the onslaught on the servers begin.
That channel inventory comment is very interesting. Why won’t apple release their internal channel inventory? I’m curious
All this blaming the analysts is dumb, give it a rest.
Apple made a lot of money but it was a poor quarter by thier standards. YOY growth was the lowest it’s been in a long time. Perhaps this will temper expectations of both analysts and fanboys alike, who think Apple will blowout every single time.
I just want to know who are the nitwits who sell off in the after-hours bloodbaths. I fear it’s the guys who run our retirement accounts.