Apple margins fall in fourth quarter results
Revenue down – but Apple still makes money by the boatload
Falling profits are no longer the stuff of nightmares around the Apple Campus – they're becoming all to real for Apple's head honchos.
Apple's recent fourth quarter results show that gross margin fell from 39.9% a year ago to 38% in the fourth quarter of 2016. Quarterly revenue was down from $51.5 billion to $46.9 billion, and net income also dropped from $11.1 billion to $9 billion.
Of course, that is still a huge amount of money for any company, and it's unlikely that Tim Cook will be feeling the heat too much. But for a company that was once known for its unflagging march towards higher and higher profits, it's a sign of the changing times in the ultra-competitive tech world.
There were some healthy signs, though. The services side of grew 24%, driven by operations such as the App Store and iCloud.
Furthermore, Apple posted some bullish guidance for the first quarter of 2017: expected revenue between $76 billion and $78 billion, and gross margin between 38% and 38.5%. The increased revenue is likely to be due to the sales bump from the iPhone 7, as well as the newly updated MacBook Pros.