After a rare earnings miss in the previous quarter, Apple's fiscal 2012 first quarter revenue was $46.34 billion, up 73% compared to last year's fourth quarter report. Despite being the first fiscal quarter of 2012, the time spanned 14 weeks and ended December 31, 2011.
Apple sold 37.04 million iPhones and 15.43 million iPads in the quarter, the company revealed in an earnings report. The company's net income more than doubled last year's profit of $6 billion, finishing with $13.06 billion profit.
The fourth quarter was the first that iPhone 4S was on sale, and judging by the 37 million iPhones sold, I'd say things have gone pretty well. It was also more than double the total from last year's fourth quarter of 16.2 million, showing the demand for new iPhones still exist. Apple's chief financial analyst Peter Oppenheimer revealed that the company has now sold 315 million iOS devices in total as of December 2011.
“We’re thrilled with our outstanding results and record-breaking sales of iPhones, iPads and Macs,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline.”
Unfortunately iPod sales dropped 21 percent to 15.4 million units sold, but given the iPhone and iPad's ability to play music, that was to be expected.
“We are very happy to have generated over $17.5 billion in cash flow from operations during the December quarter,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s CFO. “Looking ahead to the second fiscal quarter of 2012, which will span 13 weeks, we expect revenue of about $32.5 billion and we expect diluted earnings per share of about $8.50.”
