Since it's debut in 2007, iPhone sales have become one of the most watched line items in Apple's quarterly report. With the iPhone segment making up over 70% of sales for the tech behemoth, it's now become critical for the company to start diversifying their revenue stream.
For their fiscal third quarter, 500 Estimize contributors have made estimates for Apple, an all time high for any stock covered on the platform. The Estimize community is expecting Apple to record EPS of $1.86 vs. Wall Street's $1.80, a 45% increase YoY. The top-line is almost equally as impressive with Estimize looking for $49.5B, topping both Wall Street and company guidance, and also posting YoY growth of 32%.
These are stellar growth numbers for a company of Apple's size. As stated, most of this is due to the continued success of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. While estimates for FQ3 iPhone sales range from around 43 – 53 million units sold, the consensus is for somewhere north of 49M in comparison to the year-ago quarter's 35M, a 40% increase. This is well below the 74.5M and 61M posted in the first and second fiscal quarters, but still quite remarkable at this cycle of the phone's existence and for the the third fiscal quarter. The year-over-year average sales price (ASP) has also received a boost of $62, bringing the cost of one phone to $659, equalling an estimated $32.5B in revenue attributed to the phone for the period.
China is becoming an increasingly important market for Apple. Nearly 29% of total revenue came from the Greater China region in the last quarter. Sales in the region also grew 71% YoY, far outpacing the 27% increase in global revenue during the period. And while global growth has slowed for the overall smartphone space, with many analysts believing the US in particular will be fully saturated by 2017, Apple must continue to expand into developing and emerging markets to achieve growth targets. Price could be the biggest pain point as they do this. While India is often seen as the largest untapped smartphone market, affordability is tantamount and makes the iPhone an unpopular choice.
