Apple's profit rockets 125%

Apples 125% jump in quarterly profit stunned Wall Street, but it may be just a prelude to even bigger gains ahead.

Apple managed to post a record $7.3 billion in fiscal third-quarter earnings despite not having released a blockbuster product in nearly six months. Now as the company prepares to roll out a slate of new products — including a new iPhone, Macintosh computers and a new mobile operating system — analysts say Apple could post larger profit in the second half of the year.
Andy Hargreaves, a senior analyst said, From now until the end of the year, I can't think of a time when they'll have a stronger few months of new products.

In addition to new products, Apple has been pushing sales of its devices overseas, including in the world's largest consumer market, China. Apple said its revenue in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan combined has grown sixfold in just the last year and now accounts for about 15% of the company's quarterly revenue.

Apple's revenue rose 82% to $28.6 billion, up from $15.7 billion a year earlier.

Company sold a record 20.3 million iPhones during the quarter that ended in June, a nearly 150% increase over the same period last year, and almost 2 million more than its quarterly record. That increase is notable given that Apple's iPhone sales have generally declined in that fiscal quarter as users have waited for a newer version of the phone.

Apple sold 9.3 million iPads during the quarter, beating its record of 7.3 million, and also sold nearly 4 million Mac computers, a 14% increase from a year earlier. Sales of its iPod music player, however, dropped 20% from a year earlier to 7.5 million.

The company on Tuesday vaguely referred to the release of its next iPhone as "a future product transition we're not going to talk about today," Apple observers have been buzzing about a new iPhone model — or possibly several — to be released in September.

Much of Apple's success, the company said, is coming from accelerating iPhone sales in more than 100 countries, including in many emerging markets in Europe, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East.

But the biggest growth has come from phones sales in what Apple refers to as Greater China, — the mainland as well as Hong Kong and Taiwan. That number is likely to continue growing as Apple establishes new partners in Asia.