Apple Expected To Post First $100+ Billion Quarterly Revenue

Apple is expected to post its first quarterly revenue that tops $100 billion, according to the Financial Times on Tuesday (Jan. 26), citing Wall Street analysts.

“The fact that they look able to achieve the $100 billion milestone with slower revenue growth for the iPhone suggests that they’ve done an amazing job of diversifying their portfolio,” Tom Forte, analyst at DA Davidson, told FT. 

The $2.38 trillion tech giant is anticipated to post its fiscal year first-quarter earnings on Wednesday (Jan. 27) that will total $102.6 billion. That number is up from $91.8 billion last year, per FT, citing Visible Alpha. Apple’s net profit is expected to jump 6.3 percent to $23.6 billion.

Quarters totaling $100 billion are rare, with just a few firms — like Walmart — reporting such numbers. Apple is tracking to show profit margins of roughly 23 percent — roughly five times that of either Amazon or Walmart. The numbers assume iPhone sales will grow 6 percent.

Evercore ISI Analyst Amit Daryanani is among the few experts projecting that Apple will reach just $94 billion in revenue due to supply constraints. 

“But this is a reflection of how much supply they have — not of how much demand there is,” Daryanani said. “The demand is much higher than supply.” 

He also believes Apple in 2021 could see its shares escalate to $200, turning it into a $3 trillion company. Daryanani thinks Apple could benefit from two macro trends — the weakened U.S. dollar and higher corporate taxes from the Biden administration.

About 60 percent of Apple’s cash flow is not from the U.S., which could help its bottom line due to the weakened U.S. dollar.

“Foreign exchange has always been a big drag for Apple, but this is one time it should be a tailwind,” Daryanani told FT. “And this is the first time we’ve seen component costs come down, so that could be another nice benefit for an earnings-per-share or free cash flow perspective.” 

Apple and Verizon are among the many tech companies supplying connectivity services that have been getting ready for 5G. Verizon said expanded 5G availability was coming to a range of cities and that its partnership with Microsoft would accelerate deployments. A separate T-Mobile announcement indicated that it was rolling out near-nationwide on its own 5G network.