Apple rakes in £64bn in just three months
APPLE shares surged last night after the US giant smashed Wall Street’s expectations with quarterly sales of $1bn per day.
The iPhone maker said sales jumped from £41.9bn to £64.4bn in the first three months of 2021, as customers snapped up its iPhones, MacBook computers and iPad tablets. Over the same period, profits more than doubled from £8bn to £16.8bn.
Analysts had predicted sales of £55.6bn and profits of £12bn.
The blowout figures sent Apple’s shares almost 3pc higher in after-hours trading and came as social networking giant Facebook also published results.
Last night Apple boss Tim Cook said: ‘This quarter reflects both the enduring ways our products have helped our users meet this moment in their own lives, as well as the optimism consumers seem to feel about better days ahead for all of us.’
It comes after Apple reported record revenues of £80bn in its first quarter – the final three months of 2020 – marking the first time it had surpassed the $100bn mark.
The second quarter is usually less busy for the company but analysts have said the pandemic, which has resulted in people spending more time at home due to restrictions, has boosted sales of computers, tablets and other gadgets. Apple is still riding high after launching the iPhone 12 in September, the first one of its handsets to offer 5G data services.
The firm reported a 66pc rise in sales of the iPhone in the three months to March 31, while Mac computer sales rose 70pc and iPad sales rose 79pc.
Sales of wearables such as the Apple Watch and Earpods also rose 25pc, while revenues from services such as Apple Music and iCloud storage rose 27pc.
Minutes earlier, Facebook had reported its first quarter results. It said revenues for the period rose from £12.7bn to £18.8bn and profits almost doubled from £3.5bn to £6.8bn – with both figures beating Wall Street forecasts.
Facebook’s average number of monthly users rose 10pc to 2.85bn. The firm makes most of its money from advertising.
It followed a similar bonanza at rival ad seller Alphabet, which owns Google.
Over the same period, Google said its revenues rose from £29.6bn to £39.7bn in the first three months of 2021, with profits surging from £4.9bn to £12.9bn.
The results are also being seen as a sign that the tech giants may hold on to the gains they made during the pandemic, as vaccines are rolled out and restrictions eased in many western countries.
However, ahead of Apple’s results, Goldman Sachs had warned that the opening up of the economy could dent sales of the company’s gadgets in the coming months.