Wall Street’s Predictions For Apple Tomorrow: This Could Be The Best Quarter Ever
Apple will announce its quarterly earnings for the 2012 holiday season tomorrow, and investors are nervous. The company’s stock has been on quite the roller coaster ride since its $700 high back in September 2012. AAPL is now trading right around $500, which is the lowest it has been in more than six months.
Recent reports have said that demand for products like the iPhone is faltering. That’s why it may come as a surprise that Wall Street expects Apple to have its best earnings report ever tomorrow. So is it a good time to sell AAPL? Now may actually be the best time to buy.
Apple expected to report $52 billion in revenue for this first fiscal quarter of 2013, up from $46.33 billion in revenue this time last year. $36 billion was reported last quarter. Why the huge jump? Because the numbers that Apple are about to report tomorrow include sales from the 2012 holiday season. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that iPhones and iPads were at the top of most kids’ Christmas lists.
And despite all the negative press and rumors of Apple cutting orders overseas due to weak demand, Wall Street is surprisingly optimistic. Sales will be up across the board.
We’ve collected a few well known analysts’ predictions in the chart below:
| Revenue | iPhones | iPads | Macs | iPods | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Horace Dediu, Asymco | 60 billion | 55.5 million | 24.4 million | 5 million | 11.2 million |
| Peter Misek, Jefferies | 59.55 billion | 53 million | 24 million | 5.3 million | 12.6 million |
| Gene Munster, Piper Jaffray | 53.85 billion | 45 million | 25 million | 4.83 million | 12.3 million |
| Brian White, Tokepa | 53.32 billion | 43.06 million | 26 million | 5.13 million | 9.62 million |
| Mark Moskowitz, J.P. Morgan | 52.79 billion | 47.95 million | 20.06 million | 5.29 million | 13.53 million |
| Apple | 52 billion | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
The general consensus is that Apple will report between $52-60 billion in revenue. Today Google reported $14.4 billion in revenue for last quarter. Samsung is the only competitor that comes close (and could possibly top Apple) with $53.6 billion in revenue for Q4 2012. Apple still rakes in way more profits than anyone else.
The iPhone 5 and iPad mini will likely play a huge role in iOS devices sales from the 2012 holidays. Analysts agree that between 24-26 million iPads were sold, and the new iPad mini is likely most responsible for driving sales with its $329 price tag. To put that into perspective, Microsoft has sold only 1 million Surface tablets.
Apple will hold a live earnings call on its investors page tomorrow at 2 p.m. PST/ 5 p.m. EST. As usual, Cult of Mac will be providing breaking coverage.
Alex Heath is a news contributor at Cult of Mac. He previously served as an editor for iDownloadBlog. You can find out more about him on his 
