Apple records its biggest and most profitable quarter ever
Thanks in large part to selling 74.8 million iPhones, Apple recently recorded its best quarter ever. The company earned $75.9 billion in revenue and a profit of $18.4 billion in the first quarter of fiscal year 2016.
To put those numbers in perspective, the $18.4 billion profit was the largest ever recorded by any publicly traded company.
“Our team delivered Apple’s biggest quarter ever, thanks to the world’s most innovative products and all-time record sales of iPhone, Apple Watch and Apple TV,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “The growth of our Services business accelerated during the quarter to produce record results, and our installed base recently crossed a major milestone of one billion active devices.”
“Our record sales and strong margins drove all-time records for net income and EPS in spite of a very difficult macroeconomic environment,” said Luca Maestri, Apple’s CFO. “We generated operating cash flow of $27.5 billion during the quarter, and returned over $9 billion to investors through share repurchases and dividends. We have now completed $153 billion of our $200 billion capital return program.”
During the same quarter, Apple sold 16.1 million iPads and 5.3 million Macs. Sixty-six percent of sales were from outside the United States.
As expected, Apple didn’t announce specific Apple Watch or Apple TV sales figures, instead choosing to place the sales figures for both devices in the “Other” category. But interestingly, compared to the same time last year, revenue in that category increased 62 percent to $4.35 billion.
Starting at 2 p.m. PDT, Apple will hold a financial results conference call for analysts. Anyone can listen by heading here. We’ll update you if Apple announces any big news during the audio webcast.