“The bad news is that every analyst we’ve surveyed — even the most bullish — believes that for the first time in a decade Apple (AAPL) will report that its income this quarter was lower than the same quarter the year before,” Philip Elmer-DeWitt reports for Fortune.
“According to Thomson Financial, the consensus EPS for fiscal Q2 2013 on Friday was $10.18, down from $12.30 in Q2 2012,” P.E.D. reports. “The analysts we’ve heard from so far are even more pessimistic. Their estimates range from a low of $9.23 to a high of $10.39 for a mean EPS of $9.85.
P.E.D. reports, “The good news for investors is that Wall Street seems to have already priced this negative income growth into the stock. Judging from the performance of Apple’s shares since early March, the smart money has been pouring back into the company for the past three weeks.”
Read more in the full article here.
Robert Paul Leitao writes for Posts at Eventide, “Since FQ3 2012, Apple’s rate of year-over-year earnings per share growth has fallen below the rate of revenue growth. This trend will continue through the March quarter due to the extraordinary high gross margin achieved in the first half of last fiscal year.”
“It’s not a coincidence Apple’s gross margin reached extraordinary high levels in the first six months following the release of the iPhone 4S,” Leitao writes. “he iPhone 4S is the second handset in the iPhone 4 series and delivered record gross margin due in part to Apple’s ability to apply the fixed costs of iPhone 4 series production over a much larger number of units sold.”
Leitao writes, “Looking forward, Apple’s gross margin performance will improve following the release of the second iPhone 5 series handset.”
Tons more in the full article – recommended – here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]