What's Up With Apple: Pre-Preview of Q2 Earnings, Spring Loaded and More

Technology

Published: April 15, 2021 8:11 am

In two weeks, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) will report fiscal second-quarter results. After posting a high of around $143 in late January, Apple’s stock price dropped about $27 by early March. Since then, it’s gained back roughly $16 to close on Wednesday at $132.03. The stock’s 52-week range is $66.36 to $145.09.

Yet, inquiring minds want to know, how did Apple perform last quarter? Did it sell bushels of iPhones? Did it pile up even more cash?

Amit Daryanani of Evercore ISI on Wednesday added Apple to the firm’s list of top investment picks (called the Tactical Outperform list) because Evercore believes Apple “looks well positioned to report upside” to March quarter estimates. The analyst noted that iPhone sales and strength in the Services segment are driving results.

Courtesy of Philip Elmer-DeWitt at Apple 3.0, here’s Evercore’s conclusion:

Net/Net: AAPL is positioned to report sizable upside vs. expectations for March-qtr and guide June-qtr inline to somewhat ahead of expectations. Long-term, AAPL is positioned to sustain mid/high single digit sales and low-teens EPS growth on a secular basis.

Note the key phrase: “sizable upside.” Evercore has an Outperform rating on Apple stock and Wall Street’s highest price target: $175.

Apple CEO Tim Cook is planning to testify in the lawsuit brought against Apple by Epic Games over the 30% commission Apple charges to include an app on its App Store. Other Apple bigwigs, including Senior Vice President Craig Federighi and former marketing chief Phil Schiller are also on the witness list. The trial is scheduled to begin next month in El Paso.

Wednesday’s announcement of the April 20 Spring Loaded event will fill podcasts and news stories both during the run-up to the event and then for a week or so after. Redesigned iMacs, new iPads, AirTags, maybe an announcement about a partner to build an Apple Car, the list of possible announcements and products is seemingly endless.

Here’s one that may or may not mean anything, except that some Apple watchers have too much time on their hands. If someone were to rotate and resize Apple’s graphic for Spring Loaded, it ends up looking a lot like the familiar welcome screen Apple designed for the very first Mac. This is what Macworld thinks it looks like: