“After knocking the socks off Wall Street estimates, Apple Inc. was rewarded with price-target upgrades on Tuesday by several analysts and a declaration that the iPhone maker may have left its competition in the dust for good,” Barbara Kollmeyer reports for MarketWatch.
“Apple sold 39.2 million iPhones in its fiscal fourth quarter, far more than Wall Street forecasts of 37.8 million units, and the company said it can’t meet demand for the new iPhone 6,” Kollmeyer reports. “The success of the iPhone and corresponding struggles at rival Samsung Electronics Co. are ‘driving people into the AAPL ecosystem for the long term,’ said Chris Caso, analyst at SIG Susquehanna… He pointed to exceptional sales of Macs in the third quarter as proof. The company shipped 5.5 million Macs in the September quarter, which surpassed Susquehanna’s estimate of 4.3 million and consensus of 4.9 million. ‘In total, we think it’s going to become increasingly difficult for competitors to break the market dominance that Apple is now achieving,’ said Caso.”
“Apple’s price target was lifted to $115 from $110 by Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty and her team, who also say the iPhone cycle should be stronger for longer,” Kollmeyer reports. “As well, only half of the 250 million iPhone 4s and older devices still in use are expected to be upgraded this year, which means ‘considerable pent-up demand’ could be seen in 2016, she said. And if Apple Pay or Apple Watch gain traction, the potential for iPhone upgrades could be even greater.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: 5.5 million Macs sold in 91 days.
As we wrote on January 10, 2005, after Apple had just reported 836,000 Macs sold in Q405:
As we have always said, even as many short-sightedly waved (and continue to wave) the white flag, the war is not over. And, yes, we shall prevail… No company is invincible. Not even Microsoft.
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