Apple launched extraordinary financial results for the fourth quarter, with revenues hitting a record high of US$94.9 billion with a 6% growth over the same quarter of last year. The main growth drivers are strong sales of the newly released iPhone 16 line and steady growth in the services side of the company.
However, the tech giant witnessed a deep cut in profits as the company's profit slipped to US$14.7 billion due to one-off tax payment US$10.2 billion connected to an EU court judgment ruling.
CEO Tim Cook showed enthusiasm saying, "During the quarter, we were excited to announce our best products yet, with the all-new iPhone 16 lineup, Apple Watch Series 10, AirPods 4, and remarkable features for hearing health and sleep apnea detection."
According to Cook, for the first time, it was observed that the iPhone sales grew up to an all-time high, which raised a mammoth amount of US$46.2 billion in revenue. This is a decent growth of 5.5% from last year. The CEO indicated that the units of iPhone 16 sold more in the first week compared to iPhone 15 of the same period previous year.
The services business segment had also contributed to great success for Apple as the company's reports set new revenue records, reaching an all-time high of $24.97 billion, a 12 percent year-over-year revenue growth.
For its part, the corporation was able to double a certain number of paid subscribers since its launch, now above one billion on all Apple platforms.
Revenue for hardware sales stood at US$7.74 billion, while iPad sales is US$6.95 billion which grew from 8 percent year-on-year. The wearables segment, inclusive of watches and AirPods sales came in at US$9.04 billion, 3 percent lower year-on-year.
Cook also notes that "Users are adopting iOS 18.1 at twice the rate that they adopted 17.1 in the year-ago quarter,". Cook said other improvements and features awaited the company for December.
Localized English support will open the doors of Apple Intelligence expansion around the world by this December in the UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand. Further language support will roll out in April 2025, including English for India, Chinese, Korean, German, and Italian.
In his final earnings call, retiring CFO Luca Maestri said Apple's active installed base of devices reached new all-time highs across all products and regions, with strong customer satisfaction rates reported across major product lines.
Apple is likely to have low to mid-single-digit revenue growth in the holiday quarter, with services growing at double-digit rates.