On an earnings call Tuesday, Apple executives reported a record-breaking fiscal first quarter, ending Dec. 26, with quarterly revenue of $75.9 billion and net income of $18.4 billion.
In the same quarter last year, Apple reported revenue of $74.6 billion and net income of $18.4 billion. International sales accounted for 66% of its latest quarterly revenue, according to the tech giant.
Apple CEO Tim Cook said the company’s signature iPhones, Apple Watch and Apple TV products hit “all-time record sales. The growth of our services business accelerated during the quarter to produce record results, and our installed base recently crossed a major milestone of one billion active devices.”
“Our record sales and strong margins drove all-time records for net income and [earnings per share] in spite of a very difficult macroeconomic environment,” said Apple CFO Luca Maestri. “We generated operating cash flow of $27.5 billion during the quarter, and returned over $9 billion to investors through share repurchases and dividends. We have now completed $153 billion of our $200 billion capital return program.”
Here’s an audio recording of the entire earnings call.
Looking at the next fiscal quarter of 2016, Apple projects revenue of between $50 billion and $53 billion; gross margin between 39% and 39.5%; operating expenses between $6 billion and $6.1 billion; and a tax rate of 25.5%.
Based on reports, Apple sold 74.8 million iPhones in the first quarter of 2016, which missed projections of 75.46 million iPhones sold.
FBR Capital Markets analyst Daniel Ives told CNBC, “You’ve got to take off the rose colored glasses. This was definitely a bit of a gut punch for the bulls.”
Ives looked ahead to the release of the next iteration of the iPhone: “Ultimately, it comes down to iPhone 7. That’s really what you’re really hanging your hat on. It’s a hand-holding period. You don’t put up the white flag. It’s a turbulent period, but I think brighter days are ahead with iPhone 7, as well as what Cook does with $200 billion in cash.”
