“Apple’s (AAPL) shares have been getting slammed as Wall Street frets about its March quarter earnings report, due out next Tuesday,” Philip Elmer-DeWitt reports for Fortune.
“Whether the stock bounces from the 16-month low it hit Wednesday or sinks even lower may depend less on iPhone or iPad sales than on its guidance for the June quarter and what it reports about a relatively obscure ratio closely watched by analysts: the company’s gross margin, or GM%,” P.E.D. reports. “‘Gross margins are likely to shape sentiment surrounding Apple’s stock,’ Bernstein’s Toni Sacconaghi wrote in a note to clients Wednesday, ‘as they are key metric underpinning both the bull and bear cases.'”
P.E.D. reports, “In January, Apple management said it was confident the company could report gross margins for the March quarter somewhere between 37.5% and 38.5%. Most analysts expect Apple to come in at the high end of that range. In fact, among the 60 we polled — including 37 Wall Street professionals and 23 amateurs — the median estimate was exactly 38.5%.”
Full article, with a long list of individual sell-side and independent analysts’ estimates for Apple, here.
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