Replies to post #59238 on Apple Inc (AAPL)

[Daidalus]

Please point to Apple boosterism.

"There is so little Apple Bashing here it is not worth mentioning."

Please. Allow me to treat you as an intelligent human, will you?

I just find it hard to take when something that's serious is spun as a joke. Maybe you are not as sensitive, or maybe you are under special circumstances.

And, please try and understand that most of you here are probably not like most of us out there.

I made money too, so now we're buddies.

[spitsong]

Reality check on Apple's quarter

SAN DIEGO (MarketWatch) -- It's all about how you want to interpret the numbers. Take Apple Computer, Inc., where analysts, the media and almost everybody else it seems is transfixed on the big year-over-year gains in Mac and iPod unit sales.

Apple gives you the numbers right at the top of the press release. They're impressive, with the big story a 12% year-over-year gain -- 19% sequentially -- for Macs. Operating margins for the company, which had been sliding, were also slightly higher.

So, what's not to like? Plenty, especially when you consider that iPod unit sales, from a quarter ago, tumbled 5% -- the second straight quarter of declines. IPod revenues from the prior quarter were down 13%. And while iPod unit sales were up 32% year-over-year, that's down from the prior quarter's 61% year-over-year gain. (Not that year-over-year results really matter that much on growth stories.)

Furthermore, Apple (AAPL: 54.10, +1.20, +2.3% ) conceded much of gain in operating margins came from lower component costs and an eye on expenses. Those, however, are not sustainable contributors to earnings.

As for the pickup in Mac sales -- it's about time. But a dose of reality: A large part of that gain, the company hinted on its conference call, came from pent-up demand for Intel-based Mac notebooks and heavy sales to the education markets. Hardly what you'd call broad-based, but at least it's a start. Not that it really shows up in overall revenues, which barely budged from a quarter ago.

CBS MarketWatch: Reality check on Apple's quarter
Commentary: It's how you interpret the numbers

http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/Story.aspx?guid=%7B003B4306-4278-4A1D-BCE9-27A701F94D9E%7D

I distrust the concept that this quarterly report will, by itself, reverse the downtrend in AAPL over the past few months, though it might well result in another local bounce (if it hasn't already).

Heh, I must be a "basher".