Despite plenty of reports about both supply and demand issues in 2017, Apple has another fantastic year market-wise. Opening at $116.16 the company eventually closed out December at $169.29, securing a 45.7% increase across the 12 months.
2018, however, has seen the company struggle to gain any definitive momentum. Though it did indeed hit an all-time high of $183.50 in mid-March, it has fallen sharply since then, tumbling to a current trading price of $163.10, only a smidge above the $156 2018 lows struck at the start of February.
While the firm’s first quarter figures back in early February were stonking, they couldn’t save the stock from the dramatic trading that defined the first half of that month. Despite an estimate-missing, year-on-year declining 77.3 million iPhones sold, Apple still posted 12.7% jump in revenue to a record $88.3 billion, around a $1 billion higher than expected. Earnings per share also beat forecasts, arriving at $3.89 against Q1 2017’s $3.36.
That drop in iPhone sales is fuelling the key concerns heading into Tuesday’s update. A leaked report suggests that the iPhone X specifically ‘is dead’, and may well be cancelled after just one generation. Still, analysts are expecting 53 million units to have been sold, a rough 4% increase on the 50.8 million shifted in the same quarter the year previous.
As for Apple’s own forecasts, the company stated back in February that it’s expecting second quarter revenue between $60 billion to $62 billion, a 15% increase year-on-year at the mid-point. Margins, meanwhile, are set to come in between 38% and 38.5%, lower than the 38.9% analysts had been looking for.
Apple Inc(NASDAQ:AAPL) (NASDAQ:AAPL) has a consensus rating of ‘Buy’ alongside an average target price of $203.89.
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