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Since the Q results, one big shot investor sold his AAPL holdings, saying that Apple's having told him they would no longer report units sold was a bridge too far.
This implies Apple told the investor personally and privately that Apple would no longer be reporting units sold and it further implies that Apple’s non-reporting of units sold is an unusual and contrarian act. That is not the case. First of all, Apple was the ONLY consumer electronics company that ever provided unit sales numbers for its products. All of the others in consumer electronics never provided units sold or even shipped. Instead companies such as IDC and Gartner estimate the number of units sold (and have done so for Apple as well in advance of Apple releasing accurate real numbers at their Financial Conference Call each quarter, often to the embarrassment of the estimating groups who consistently have had to adjust their Apple guesstimates upward). So, it is NOT an industry standard to report unit sales and in fact for Apple’s competitors the sales of their smartphones and computers in units are considered trade secrets. Secondly, Apple announced the discontinuation of unit sales to ALL investors in the fourth quarter 2018 Financial conference call and discussed doing so in the two previous financial conference calls because, with the rapid growth of the services sector, Apple’s earnings were less and less anchored to unit sales and there is no way to count services rendered.
Profits rose in the face of fewer units sold, because of the higher price.
The higher per unit price is not the cause of profits rising as Apple has iPhones for sale in retail price brackets from $349 to over $1250 and iPads from $279 to over $1000 per unit and the ASP did not rise sufficiently to account for the increased profits even though consumers showed a preference for higher end iPhones. Instead profits are being bolstered by the extraordinary double digit rise in very high margin service sector profits.
In recent years, Apple has reduced projected sales numbers internally and trimmed its parts orders, so that there wouldn't be a large unsold inventory later on.
This is patently untrue. . . Apple has used "just in time inventory" model since the late 1990s and they dynamically manage parts orders throughout the year. Apple sells every unit they make and NEVER has "unsold later on" but, in fact has a tendency and a reputation to start running low on soon to be replaced models just before product announcements. It is one of the ways the press punditry has of detecting the discontinuation and/or announcement of a replacement is coming up, given Apple’s policy of never making pre-announcements. Sudden shortages in the on-line Apple store ore lengthening delivery times is a sure sign of a product refresh.
The company returns value with stock buybacks, and since 2012 has paid a (pretty tiny) dividend.
Stock buybacks are considered PART of equity return for any company. . . and Apple has returned more than $240 BILLION to investors by that means since 2012 in addition to dividends. However, even just looking at dividends, according to CNBC in August 2017, Apple now pays the biggest dividend in the world, surpassing Exxon's payout, surpassing Exxon Mobile, and Apple’s board increased their dividend three times since then.
Apple's most recent product rollout included a refresh of its iPad, MacBook, and (surprisingly) MacMini lines. Apple's next product rollout rumored to include another refresh of MacBook Air (i7 version).
Not the MacBook. . . that was updated several product updates back. , . And the MacBook Air was already updated with the Mac mini and the iPad Pro announcement on October 30th.
This same "Apple has cut production of iPhone parts/orders" ploy was pulled by the same reporters last year at the same time frame and using the same unnamed sources. . . and is based on the same things. Apple ALWAYS pulls back orders for the second fiscal quarter of 2019 (the first calendar quarter of 2019, because SALES of those products in that quarter is always about 50%-60% of the sales of the previous quarter and manufacturing of the products to be sold during that quarter MUST be done in the preceding quarter! Ignorant investors hearing that Apple has cut orders by 40% over LAST quarter’s orders assume it is somehow related to soft sales in THIS quarter, which is the intent the writers of these articles want to imply to readers so they can (1) depress sales and (2) depress AAPL stock prices, and (3) please their competing advertisers, and (4) please AAPL shorters and (5) please investors who want to buy more AAPL shares at bargain prices.
In other words, they are reporting the normal course of quarterly business ordering to prepare for the expected iPhone demand for the January through March quarter, not the orders for iPhones being made for sales in the current October through December quarter. . . which independent reports are showing are selling like hot cakes at a lumberjack convention.