Reporting third-quarter earnings after market close Tuesday, Apple reported a strong jump in earnings, but still missed estimates. The company posted net income of $8.8billion on revenue of $35 billion. Earnings per share were $9.32. Both numbers missed Wall Street estimates. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters had been expecting Apple to post earnings per share of $10.36 on revenue of $37.2 billion.

Apple’s guidance for the fourth quarter also disappointed: The company forecast $7.65 a share for earnings on revenue of $34 billion. Analysts had been looking for $10.22 a share in earnings on revenue of $38 billion.

Apple said it sold 26 million iPhones for the quarter, up 28 percent from the year prior; 17 million iPads, up 84 percent; 4 million Macs, up 2 percent; and 6.8 million iPods, down 10 percent. Wall Street was expecting iPhone sales of 29 million units, iPad sales of 16 million units, Mac sales of 4.1 million units and iPod sales of 5.9 million units.

One bit of good news: Apple’s Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share of the Company’s common stock. The dividend is payable on August 16, 2012, to stockholders of record as of the close of business on August 13, 2012.

“We’re thrilled with record sales of 17 million iPads in the June quarter,” Apple CEO Tim Cook pointing to the lone highpoint in the company’s earnings release. “We’ve also just updated the entire MacBook line, will release Mountain Lion tomorrow and will be launching iOS 6 this Fall. We are also really looking forward to the amazing new products we’ve got in the pipeline.”

Apple shares are getting hammered in after-hours trading. At $570.05 they’re down more than 5 percent.

http://allthingsd.com/20120724/apple...er-not-a-beat/

Chipotle Mexican Grill (NYSE: CMG) announced its earnings results on Thursday. The company reported $2.56 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the analysts' consensus estimate of $2.30 by $0.26. Chipotle Mexican Grill's revenue was up 20.9% compared to the same quarter last year.

On Tuesday the restaurant reported a 7% rise in EPS to 62 cents. Revenue jumped 30% to $238.7 million.

Apple (AAPL) is not only the most profitable company in the world, but it also now owns the world’s largest hedge fund as well. Zero Hedge reports that Braeburn Capital, a Nevada-based asset management corporation that Apple founded specifically to manage its cash, now has more than $117 billion in assets under management, making it even larger than hedge fund giant Bridgewater that currently has around $100 billion in AUM.

As Zero Hedge notes, Apple has been very secretive about Braeburn’s investments and activities and has kept the company’s profile decidedly low since “Apple for now uses Braeburn primarily in its capacity to find legal tax loopholes all around the world and avoid paying taxes.” What’s more, Zero Hedge says that Braeburn exists in a sort of legal black hole where it has no reporting requirements and thus isn’t obligated to disclose to anyone what it owns. The website speculates that Braeburn could soon become much more well-known, however, as the government could soon turn its attention toward closing legal loopholes that have allowed hugely profitable companies to avoid paying taxes.

Verizon said on record that it had seen supply constraints for the iPhone 5 during the September-ending quarter.

After Verizon reported that it had made 650,000 iPhone 5 activations, Jefferies & Co. released a trimmed estimate for total iPhone 5 sales unit sales in the quarter, cutting its initial prediction of between 8 and 10 million to 5 million. “We had thought that Apple could recognize 8 to 10 million in iPhone 5 sales in Q3, but Verizon’s 650,000 implies that the number could be closer to 5 million,” Jefferies analyst Peter Misek said in a report.

Misek added that it appeared that the iPhone 4 and 4S had “made up for any iPhone 5 shortfall” and maintained his prediction of a total 26 million iPhone shipments for Apple in the quarter.

http://wallstcheatsheet.com/stocks/a...expected.html/

Number of iPads sold by Apple by quarter

Apple said it sold its 100 millionth iPad two weeks ago, two and a half years after the first model came out.

That means Apple has sold 16 million since June 30, when it last disclosed iPad sales. Apple is expected to get a boost with the release next month of a smaller iPad and an update to its full-sized one.

Here's the breakdown of iPad sales by quarter.

— 3.3 million in fiscal third quarter 2010 (through June 26); iPad went on sale April 3, 2010.

— 4.2 million in fiscal fourth quarter 2010 (through Sept. 25)

— 7.3 million in fiscal first quarter 2011 (through Dec. 25)

— 4.7 million in fiscal second quarter 2011 (through March 26); iPad 2 went on sale March 11, 2011.

— 9.3 million in fiscal third quarter 2011 (through June 25)

— 11.1 million in fiscal fourth quarter 2011 (through Sept. 24)

— 15.4 million in fiscal first quarter 2012 (through Dec. 31, 2011)

— 11.8 million in fiscal second quarter 2012 (through March 31, 2012); third-generation iPad went on sale March 16.

— 17 million in fiscal third quarter 2012 (through June 30, 2012).

— About 16 million from July to early October.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/number...201153619.html

The Street's consensus put iPad sales at just under 17.6 million, while the consensus among the indies was for sales of 19.23 million, more than 9% higher.

The average estimate among all 61 analysts was 18.38 million. The median was 18.13 million.

http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/10/...ast-quarter-3/

AT&T sold 6.1 million smartphones in the third quarter, 1.3 million more than in the third quarter a year ago. Smartphones represented 81 percent of postpaid device sales. At the end of the quarter, 63.8 percent, or 44.5 million, of AT&T's postpaid subscribers had smartphones, up from 52.6 percent, or 36.1 million, a year earlier and up 1.4 milion from the second quarter. [...]

In the quarter, the company activated 4.7 million iPhones, with 18 percent new to AT&T. The company also had its best-ever sales quarter for Android and Windows smartphones.

The Company posted quarterly revenue of $36.0 billion and quarterly net profit of $8.2 billion, or $8.67 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $28.3 billion and net profit of $6.6 billion, or $7.05 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 40.0 percent compared to 40.3 percent in the year-ago quarter.

The Company sold 26.9 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 58 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 14.0 million iPads during the quarter, a 26 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 4.9 million Macs during the quarter, a 1 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 5.3 million iPods, a 19 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.

Apple’s Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share of the Company’s common stock. The dividend is payable on November 15, 2012, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on November 12, 2012.

For the current quarter the company forecasts $52 billion in revenue and $11.75 per share in profit, way, way below the consensus $55.15 billion and $15.59.

For the current quarter the company forecasts $52 billion in revenue and $11.75 per share in profit, way, way below the consensus $55.15 billion and $15.59.