As for revenue by each group, Apple reported:
- iPhone revenue: $28.96 billion (down 7% year-over-year)
- Services revenue: $13.34 billion (up 17% year-over-year, a record all-time high)
- Wearables, Home, and Accessories revenue: $10.01 billion (a new quarterly revenue record)
- Mac revenue: $5.35 billion
- iPad revenue: $4.36 billion
Total revenue growth for the quarter decreased to 0.5% from 9% in the 2019 second quarter.
The Wall Street analyst consensus on Apple’s revenue for the second quarter was $54.6 billion, with guesstimates from the various analysts between $45.6 billion and $58 billion. The consensus Apple earnings forecast was $2.10 a share. The range of estimates ran from $1.73 to $2.73 a share.
Services a major positive for the quarter
No third-quarter guidance
Apple did not issue guidance for the fiscal third quarter, as it usually does every three months. More than two months ago in mid-February, Apple warned that the coronavirus would seriously impact supply and demand for its products – especially the iPhone – in the second quarter.
“In the short-term, it’s hard to see out the windshield to know what the next 60 days look like, and so we’re not giving guidance because of that lack of visibility and uncertainty,” Cook told CNBC after the Thursday market close.
Cook: Apple TV+ ‘doing well’ with Mac and iPad benefiting from pandemic
Cook said that the company’s TV subscription service, Apple TV+, was “doing well” as more people watched content while under lockdown, and that people were turning to iPad and Mac in increasing numbers.
“If you look at TV+ as an example, we’ve seen a significant uptick in the number of people that are viewing content as well as the engagement with content,” Cook commented.
Neither Cook or Apple CFO Luca Maestri elaborated during the conference call on actual Apple TV+ subscriber numbers.
With people staying home due to the pandemic, Cook believes that is having a positive impact on revenue of iPad and Mac sales.
“It’s clearly helping the iPad and the Mac and, for that reason … we envision both of those to have improving year-over-year performances in this current quarter,” Cook told CNBC.
“Importantly, around half of the customers purchasing Macs and iPads around the world during the quarter were new to that product, and the active installed base for both Mac and iPad reached a new all-time high,” he told analysts.
Cook: Things could have been worse, but will get better
Cook explained to analysts that overall sales saw a steep decline throughout March and early April as the shelter in place orders began to go into affect worldwide.
Apple offset declines in China with strong sales in the U.S. and Europe, where shutdowns and store closures didn’t begin until the final weeks of the March quarter.
It was the second half of April – part of the current quarter – that Apple sales began to slowly improve, even with the majority of Apple retail stores shuttered. Reasons he gave for that improvement included new product releases like the second-generation iPhone SE and consumers buying electronics to better work from home.
Cook struck an optimistic chord that the worldwide economy will recover from the pandemic and that the company’s businesses will slowly improve.
“We have great confidence in the long-term of our business,” Cook commented. “It was a very unique quarter. I’ve never had anything quite like this. I hope to never have it again, but I’m incredibly proud of the company and what was achieved during that period of time.”
Apple stock closed Thursday up $6.07, or 2.11%, to $293.80. Apple stock is now at its highest level since March 6, when it closed at $289. The stock is essentially flat year-to-date.
