Apple Crushes Expectations, Sees Record Holiday Quarter (axios.com)

Apple on Thursday reported sales and earnings well ahead of projections, and said holiday sales should be a record and ahead of many analysts' expectations. The company sold 46.6 million iPhones last quarter, which came in about 500,000 units ahead of expectations. Axios reports: Going into the earnings report, there were concerns about both iPhone 8 demand and iPhone X supply. Thursday's report should go a long way toward answering those questions. Sales were up in every region expect Japan, where business was down from the prior year, though up sequentially. Notably, the company finally saw a much-needed turnaround in Greater China, where sales of $9.8 billion were up 22% from the prior quarter and 12% from a year ago. The company's business has been weak in China for some time, though the company had predicted improvement this quarter. Apple reported $52.6 billion in revenue (vs $51.2 billion estimated) and per-share earnings of $2.02 (vs $1.87 estimated). In addition to the 46.6 million iPhones sold (vs 46.1 million estimated), the company sold 10.3 million iPads (vs about 10 million expected) and 5.4 million Macs (vs about 5 million expected).

Comments

Should Apple get a tax incentive to divide itself?

[shanen]

So I can't help wondering about the REAL costs of Apple's profits. No, I don't think Apple is destroying the planet to the degree that the Koch brothers and Exxon do. No, I don't think Apple is an evil empire like Microsoft was in its monopolistic and abusive heyday. I actually think the google has much more potential for cancerous and evil growth than Apple does, but the jury is still out and I don't want to ignore Apple's ability to create profitable fashion stampedes around peculiar fads.

And yet, I recall the recent story about the engineer who lost his job and possibly his career because his daughter visited him at the office and took a naughty picture of a new iPhone. Seems like a somewhat evil prioritization of profits over people.

In general I think tax policy should favor freedom over profit. Extreme profits tend to involve monopolies or other choice-reducing systems that cut into freedom. A progressive profits tax would encourage highly successful to reproduce into competing companies. The current profits-uber-alles tax system only encourages cancerous growth.

Also, I think smaller government must be predicated upon smaller companies. Soulless, huge, immoral, and immortal companies running amok in search of infinite profits without any control is one of the worst scenarios I can image.

Secession, please!

[Anonymous Coward]

We should start by seeing the government divide itself. It is ludicrous to think that 535 people in one city can or should rule 300 million people. This madness will come to an end, like all empires, when the economics finally catches up. But we would be better off if we had secession now. We could start by dividing the US into 8-10 smaller countries and then keep going from there.