AAPL is down significantly today ahead of Apple’s fiscal Q4 earnings call scheduled to take place tomorrow, despite the usual predictions of growth across the board by the market and the majority of analysts.
Apple shares were down around 2.70% to approximately $115 at time of writing, which Reuters noted this morning made it “the biggest drag on the three major indexes.”
As for what the market is expecting at Apple’s earnings call tomorrow, the average from analyst estimates predicted around 48.72 million iPhone units sold, which would represent growth from the 39.72 million units it sold in the same quarter last year. Of note, however, is the fact that China wasn’t included in the initial launch and thus not included in sales for Q4 earnings last year.
iPad sales would be the one area that investors should expect less than stellar results if past quarters are any indication, but we could see Tim Cook talk up the new iPad Pro expected to launch in the coming weeks as major opportunity for growth going forward.
And while Apple is unlikely to break out any sort of solid sales numbers for Apple Watch, the analyst estimates are all over the place ranging from as low as 2.5 million units to 6 million units during the quarter with an average of almost 4 million.
During its Q3 2015 earnings, Apple offered guidance for the upcoming fourth quarter results of revenue between $49 billion and $51 billion, and a gross margin between 38.5 percent and 39.5 percent. Wall Street is estimating an average of around $51 billion, on the high end of Apple’s guidance for the quarter.
While Apple reported record iPhone sales with the launch of its iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, Wall Street didn’t respond positively and AAPL stock didn’t rise, which at the time was thought to be due to expectations related to the addition of China as a launch market.
As always, we’ll have full coverage of Apple’s Q4 2015 earnings call tomorrow.
