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Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

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Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#21

Post by hw »

diminish wrote: post #15
hw wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unit sales across the iPhone, iPad and Mac were a bit disappointing but better than I expected. Still, AAPL is a behemoth and the buybacks and dividends are welcome news

Why were you disappointed? Imho a traumatic unit sales drop was feared due to some supplier numbers but it didn't happen. What were you expecting?

Well, iPhone sales have been pretty stagnant. The new iPhones Apple rolls out every year isn't exactly revolutionary. Not sure how long they can keep this up and expect people to buy new phones every cycle or every 2 cycle. The X was disappointing, given the hype, and I'd be interested to see the X sales numbers.

The Macbook Pro line is also suffering some hardware issues - keyboard, batteries, touchpad. The touch bar also has been a real annoyance, and I've been favoring my 2012 rMBP over the newer models.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#22

Post by jonknee »

diminish wrote: post #14
jonknee wrote: post #7

Some scale for the new $100b buyback program... Larger than the market cap of all but 51 of the S&P 500 (with one of those being Apple!). That's nuts!

Are there any risks with such a huge buyback in 2019 to 2020 in a mature smartphone market and in the absence of other growth drivers next to iPhone??

They have the cash and people generally invest in AAPL for reasons other than having a stake in a bond fund, so it makes some sense. Buybacks vs special dividend are debatable, but impossible to say what is better until you see the future share price. They did hike the dividend substantially too so they're playing both angles.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#23

Post by threeseed »

antirez wrote: post #13

I think the Apple future may not look good for a few reasons: 1. iPhones units sold stalled for 3 years in a row. This means the company need to seek every year some trick to earn more from each phone. It is not obvious if they'll be able to do for a long time. 2. Top Android devices are improving and Google Pixel 2 is really an incredible device that is making some iOS users switching. I've no data but my nerd frien…

> I've no data but my nerd friends are doing this a lot, and sometimes what you see in the nerd-sphere in a few years happens in the normal market

"Nerds" are the group most adept at switching back and forth so your anecdote really isn't useful in the slightest. And the numbers really don't show a systemic move back to Android.

Also this group may be trend-setters because it does happen sometimes. But far more often it doesn't. Otherwise we would've seen everyone cancel Facebook, use Bitcoin for all payments and vote for Bernie Sanders.

> They are struggling at competing in the space of the biggest ecosystems around phones. Cloud, computational photography, assistant.

iMessages is a killer platform that only exists on iOS. iCloud simply just works for most people storing photos and backing up their devices. Portrait Mode has been a key marketing differentiator in the photography space. And whilst Siri isn't as good as Alexa/Google Assistant in some areas it is better in others.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#24

Post by ChuckMcM »

That is a pretty stellar earnings release. Congratulations on another quarter of excellent execution!

I think what Apple needs are some barbarians at the gates. Something which challenges them to be greater than they are, rather than sitting back on their laurels. I continue to be surprised that they don't step into the cloud computing pool. There are some solid advantages to having a cloud infrastructure that you can use to deploy new initiatives at scale.

I also wish they would spin out their computer business (Macbook, Ma Pro, Mac Mini, iMac) into its own division. While I chided Google for creating Alphabet, having your own identity can sharpen your focus if it is done well. It would also let them decide where they wanted to go with some of the legacy product lines.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#25

Post by threeseed »

diminish wrote: post #16
antirez wrote: post #13

I think the Apple future may not look good for a few reasons: 1. iPhones units sold stalled for 3 years in a row. This means the company need to seek every year some trick to earn more from each phone. It is not obvious if they'll be able to do for a long time. 2. Top Android devices are improving and Google Pixel 2 is really an incredible device that is making some iOS users switching. I've no data but my nerd frien…

1. Maturing smartphone market. 4.No other growth drivers in sight after the failure of apple watch to become huge.

> No other growth drivers in sight after the failure of iwatch to become huge

Apple Watch is the number one smart watch.

It sold 8 millions unit last quarter (a rise of 10.3%) and represents about half of all smart watch sales. You would have to be deluded to think that it isn't anything other than a huge success.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#26

Post by diminish »

threeseed wrote: post #25
diminish wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Maturing smartphone market. 4.No other growth drivers in sight after the failure of apple watch to become huge.

> No other growth drivers in sight after the failure of iwatch to become huge Apple Watch is the number one smart watch. It sold 8 millions unit last quarter (a rise of 10.3%) and represents about half of all smart watch sales. You would have to be deluded to think that it isn't anything other than a huge success.

Apple watch is successful in smart watch market. Smart watch market seems not to be a billions-unit market. That's what I mean.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#27

Post by ksec »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #24

That is a pretty stellar earnings release. Congratulations on another quarter of excellent execution! I think what Apple needs are some barbarians at the gates. Something which challenges them to be greater than they are, rather than sitting back on their laurels. I continue to be surprised that they don't step into the cloud computing pool. There are some solid advantages to having a cloud infrastructure that you ca…

Something like Project McQueen?

https://venturebeat.com/2016/03/17/apple-cloud-project-mcque...

They also has their own CDN.

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#28

Post by ChuckMcM »

ksec wrote: post #27
ChuckMcM wrote: post #24

That is a pretty stellar earnings release. Congratulations on another quarter of excellent execution! I think what Apple needs are some barbarians at the gates. Something which challenges them to be greater than they are, rather than sitting back on their laurels. I continue to be surprised that they don't step into the cloud computing pool. There are some solid advantages to having a cloud infrastructure that you ca…

Something like Project McQueen? https://venturebeat.com/2016/03/17/apple-cloud-project-mcque... They also has their own CDN.

Yes something like that, although no follow up after 2016 other than one cryptic speculation about a data center project [1].

[1] http://fortune.com/2017/02/21/apple-data-center-project-isab...

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#29

Post by ksec »

antirez wrote: post #13

I think the Apple future may not look good for a few reasons: 1. iPhones units sold stalled for 3 years in a row. This means the company need to seek every year some trick to earn more from each phone. It is not obvious if they'll be able to do for a long time. 2. Top Android devices are improving and Google Pixel 2 is really an incredible device that is making some iOS users switching. I've no data but my nerd frien…

I still think there are huge potential market for iPhone and Mac. Especially on the Mac, the problem is Apple is a little slower without Steve Jobs.

I think the past two to three years they have been way too distracted with Apple Park, arguably the biggest Apple product since the iPhone. I think next two to three years will be important to show if they could really steer well without Steve. But I am already not liking their touchbar and quality issues on mac and FaceID, notch on iPhone X

Re: Apple Reports Q2 2018 Results

#30

Post by adpirz »

threeseed wrote: post #23
antirez wrote: post #13

I think the Apple future may not look good for a few reasons: 1. iPhones units sold stalled for 3 years in a row. This means the company need to seek every year some trick to earn more from each phone. It is not obvious if they'll be able to do for a long time. 2. Top Android devices are improving and Google Pixel 2 is really an incredible device that is making some iOS users switching. I've no data but my nerd frien…

> I've no data but my nerd friends are doing this a lot, and sometimes what you see in the nerd-sphere in a few years happens in the normal market "Nerds" are the group most adept at switching back and forth so your anecdote really isn't useful in the slightest. And the numbers really don't show a systemic move back to Android. Also this group may be trend-setters because it does happen sometimes. But far more often…

iMessage is good...for now. I don't know about others, but more and more I notice little quirks and bugs, like messages being out of order, and syncing with macOS can be iffy. I really hope they work to improve it in the next year or two, because it's starting to wear on me a bit.
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