Apple will report financial results tonight for its third fiscal quarter of 2024, which covers the period from April to June 2024 – its financial year is not based on the calendar year.
A surprise quarter?
This evening around 10:30 p.m. (just after the Olympic swimming events and the medal ceremony), the Californian firm will publish its latest figures. As usual, an audio conference and the question and answer session will follow after the site update, Tim Cook and Luca Maestri -respectively CEO and CFO of the firm- will officiate with a master hand. As a reminder, the latter takes the form of an oral presentation, in the presence of a few American journalists -always the same and hand-picked.
It should be noted that this is generally the quietest and least important quarter of the financial year. However, This year it includes the launch of several highly anticipated products, such as the MacBook Air M3, the iPad Pro M4 and the iPad Air M2. Similarly, WWDC announcements (notably AI or Apple Intelligence) could also impact the figures, with the first betas of iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1 and macOS 15.1 having been deployed on Monday evening.
As a reminder, Apple reported last year, for its third quarter of 2023: $39.67 billion for the iPhone (estimated $39.9 billion and down from $40.67 billion in Q3 2022), $6.84 billion for Macs (estimated $6.6 billion, down from $7.38 billion in Q3 2022), $5.79 billion for the iPad (estimated about $6.4 billion, down from $7.22 billion in Q3 2022) and $8.28 billion for Wearables, Home and Accessories.
Some modest forecasts
For several quarters, Tim Cook and Luca Maestri are no longer giving any indication. However, they indicated that they had high hopes for the iPad and the Services!
We expect our Services business to grow double-digit at a similar pace to the growth we reported for the first half of the fiscal year.
And we expect iPad revenue to grow double-digit. We expect gross margin to be between 45.5% and 46.5%. We expect operating expenses to be between $14.3 billion and $14.5 billion.
We expect other income and expenses to be approximately $50 million, excluding the potential impact of the mark-to-market valuation of minority investments, and our tax rate to be approximately 16%.
a consensus of 84.44 billion dollars
On the analysts’ side, and estimates from 25 of them, the turnover would fluctuate between 82.92 billion and 88.87 billion, i.e. a consensus of 84.44 billion dollars for this third fiscal quarter (+3.23%).. Finally, for earnings per share, the average stabilizes at $1.35 (between $1.29 and $1.45 per share). Last year, it was $1.26. Profit could thus reach $20.66 billion (compared to $19.881 billion a year ago, an increase of 3.92%).
Finally, all eyes are on China. After a more than gloomy period, analysts expect the beginning of a turnaround with a more measured decline in sales before a return to growth for the rest of the year. Analysts have high hopes for the iPhone 16 to restore Cupertino’s image in the country. In these conditions and with such prospects, some are looking with optimism to approach the $4 trillion mark of market capitalization.
