The Street is low. Thomson Financial is looking for 6.2% revenue growth; the congenitally bullish indies are predicting almost double that.
Click to enlarge.
My take: Last year Apple reported better than 21% revenue growth and the stock got clobbered. Go figure.
We'll find out who was closest to the mark when Apple reports on Thursday after the markets close. I'll be monitoring the earnings call and you can too. Click here just before 5 p.m. Eastern (2 p.m. Pacific).
UPDATE: For those of you commenting below on the market's reaction to Microsoft's earnings, here's a snapshot of the head fake.
“…some investors were disappointed at the pace of growth in some operating segments.”
For operating segments” read Cloud. And rightly so, with IBM now joining the Cloud crowd and focusing on it like a lase.
“We all live in an Apple Submarine….”
“In the short run, the market is a voting machine but in the long run it is a weighing machine”
I’m still wrapping my mind around the last buyback number approved by the Board in 2021 for $90 billion. What will the number be this year? I’m thinking it will be more when they announce it after the 2Q reporting period. I’m good with that kind of a “beat!”
There’s a reason IBM is up, and it’s Cloud-oriented. That’s also the reason MSFT is down, per at least one article I read today. The Cloud giveth, and the Cloud taketh away….
Just to be clear, I was speaking to the reason for the big after-hours selloff, per something I read. Details do make a difference!
That said, a 1 or 2% gain after-hours could also be down to big money trying to shore up MSFT….
We have to remember that the pre-and-after-markets don’t require nearly the volume to push a share in any given direction.
Regardless, I’ve given up on AAPL earnings pops lately. Seems if earnings are either good, meet or near-miss = sell off. And while a remote possibility, a spectacular earnings beat creates a ‘tough compare’ = sell off. No winning scenario. It also doesn’t seem to matter recently whether AAPL’s run-up or -down pre-earnings.
I miss Mr. Jobs’ management of WS.
Unfortunately (and I greatly hope I’m wrong)…”
Don’t know how you’re looking at AAPL, but as a long time AAPL long, I can assure you this is very much not anything to worry about. I said the same thing last year, and it turned out pretty darned well in the final analysis.
Keep the faith!
Thumbs up! Nice to know you’re on the crew of the Apple Submarine!
So true! Selectively ignoring salient facts is typical of those “analysts” who feed on the clicks of the Apple haters…
https://apple.news/ATWmH0POUQGiwrkh0jw9tdw
I’d click on it, but I refuse to feed my clicks to an obvious click-troll like Rod Hall. If you could put a clip of his comments here, I’d greatly appreciate it!
BARRON’S TAKE
Apple Reports Earnings Thursday. Here’s Why at Least One Analyst Is Cautious.
Apple stock has stalled out, dragged down by the broader slide in stock valuations. The company reports December quarter results Thursday afternoon, and bulls think strong iPhone sales could power a better-than-expected top line, and profits. But not everyone is so sure.
Goldman Sachs analyst Rod Hall, who carries a Neutral rating on Apple (ticker: AAPL) stock, has long been one of the Street’s more-cautious analysts on the shares, and this quarter is no exception. He sees risk the quarter will disappoint.
Hall says that both retail sales data and Chinese data on handset sales suggest “slower momentum in December” than in recent months. He thinks the trend could trigger cautious commentary from Apple on the outlook for March-quarter iPhone demand. He’s also cautious on Apple’s Services business, based on moderating growth from both the App Store and search revenue. He says that Apple may have executed better-than-plan against supply constraints, but adds that both services and fading iPhone demand late in the quarter “add risk to both the quarter and outlook commentary.”
For the Services segment, he notes that growth in the September 2021 fiscal year was 27%, accelerating from about 16% in each or the two prior years. Hall points out that data from the app tracking firm Sensor Tower suggest that revenue growth from the App Store decelerated throughout calendar 2021.
The Goldman analyst also notes that Apple’s fiscal first quarter this time actually ended Dec. 25, rather than Dec. 31, pushing sales from the typically strong post-Christmas week into the fiscal second quarter.
He adds that “widely publicized supply shortages may have driven consumers to pull forward holiday shopping making December data harder to interpret than in a more normal year.” He points out that December U.S. retail sales were down 3.1%, “much weaker than expected.” Not least, he contends that recent subscriber growth weakness at Netflix and moderating demand for Peloton hardware suggest an ebbing of pandemic-era demand spikes that have been a boon to Apple over the past two years.
Further, these ‘buyback opportunities’ come with volatility. As market cap grows and we’re dependent on ever more investors holding larger portions of their portfolio in AAPL, that risk works against AAPL . . . at least short-term.
Traders actually does not care if the stock goes up or down, they can make money both ways. They use the thinly traded after-hours market to case the fluctuations so they can take advantage of the moves.
Short term I am actually not too worried about which direction AAPL goes after earnings. Slightly longer term (this year) I am watching it more since I will have to sell some from my IRA for my RMD.