Apple's fiscal Q1 2019: Desperately seeking consensus

What does the Street expect from Apple’s earnings report next week? Depends whom you ask.

Below: Four versions of the consensus, freshly gathered Wednesday morning.

Click to enlarge.

Guide to the numbers:

• Visible Alpha: Consortium of large financial institutions for their own internal use.
• Estimize: Crowd-sourced site that invites anonymous estimates
• Thomson Reuters: Average used by most public sites (e.g. Yahoo Finance).
• Apple 3.0: This site’s mix of pros and idies has out-performed Thomson Reuters for at least 8 quarters in a row. Plus, it names names (see Best and Worst).

Bottom line: The consensus of consensuses is that Apple’s December quarter revenue will be slightly better than its warning suggested, but will fall short of last year’s revenue by anywhere from 3.2% to 4.8%.

We’ll find out whose consensus was closest to the mark when Apple reports its earnings for the December quarter on Tuesday, Jan. 29. I’ll be monitoring the earnings call with analysts and you can too. Click here for instructions.