Earnings estimates are $10.18 per share, compared with $10.09 a year ago, which is not exactly stellar growth when you consider that Apple has been buying back shares as well. Thomson Reuters has revenues pegged at $43.53 billion, which would be a tiny 0.2% drop from the $43.60 billion a year ago.
Apple’s second-quarter guidance from January called for revenue between $42 billion and $44 billion, gross margin between 37% and 38%, operating expenses between $4.3 billion and $4.4 billion, other income/(expense) of $200 million and a tax rate of 26.2%.
The so-called whisper number, according to WhisperNumber.com, is $10.29 per-share earnings, and with a range of $9.95 to $10.50.
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One additional hope is for a dividend hike and more news of the buyback plans ahead. Apple and Tim Cook are no longer under the pressure of activist investor Carl Icahn, but Apple’s quarterly dividend of $3.05 per share has now been paid four quarters in a row.
We also will be looking to see how China Mobile played into this past quarter. The company’s international sales accounted for 63% of last quarter’s revenue.
Another concern is that iPads and iPhones are believed by some investors and analysts to be a drag on Apple’s Mac sales. The company’s most recent quarter showed that it sold 4.8 million Macs, versus 4.1 million a year earlier (the holiday quarter). If we compare today’s number in Mac sales for the March quarter, Apple sold just under 4 million Macs in the quarter this year versus 4 million in the March quarter of 2012.
Apple | AAPL Price Prediction shares closed at $531.70 on Tuesday, against a 52-week range of $388.87 to $575.14. The consensus price target for the stock is almost $595. As far as chart support, the 50-day moving average is right around the current price at $531.70, and the 200-day moving average is down a $507.81.
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