New | Apple surprises by selling more iPhones than expected in third quarter, shares surge
Iconic phone maker gears up for launch of iPhone 7 in September; sales wane in China
Apple sold more iPhones than Wall Street expected in the third quarter and forecast revenue in the current period would top many analysts’ targets, soothing fears that demand for Apple’s most important product had hit a wall.
Its shares rose almost 7 per cent in after-hours trading.
The world’s most valuable publicly traded company said it sold 40.4 million iPhones in the third quarter, down 15 per cent from the year-ago quarter but slightly more than the average analyst forecast of 40.02 million, according to research firm FactSet StreetAccount.
IPhone sales dropped for the second straight quarter, and Apple’s total revenue fell 14.6 per cent in the fiscal third quarter, ended June 25.
Demand for Apple’s phones has waned in China, partly because of economic uncertainty there, and has also slowed in more mature markets as people tend to hold on to their phones for longer.
Apple Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri said the company’s performance had topped his expectations in a quarter weighed down by tough foreign exchange rates and difficult comparisons with blockbuster iPhone 6 sales from the previous year.
Apple reduced channel inventory by US$3.6 billion, exceeding the $2 billion expected reduction, meaning sales were better than they appeared, Maestri said.
Customer demand “was better than what is implied in our results and better than we had anticipated,” he told Reuters in an interview.
