There has been a lot of discussion about Apple’s decision not to reveal hardware unit sales following its earning’s call on Thursday. Investors certainly did not like it and we saw Apple’s stock price tumble by as much as 7% in the aftermath. There is an interesting—if sometimes snarky—piece of analysis on Yahoo! Finance that discusses Apple’s attempts to project itself as a services company, less reliant on hardware sales than it has ever been. It concludes that this is a transition phase for Apple. Here’s a snippet:
Apple may want to project itself as a services company and want to direct investor attention to the services story and also, how it is a great place for customer satisfaction and security.
But it’s a little hard to sell that story when the services business contributed just 16% of revenue — yes even if that 16% represents a 27% increase from last year after one-time items, and even if that growth rate was substantially higher than the rest of the business.
Check It Out: Apple has Good Reasons not to Publish Hardware Sales
Apple was the only phone manufacturer that actually reported sales to the ultimate buyers. Everyone else reported numbers to resellers and ignore product returns. Given all that BS in unit sales, then, the only number that truly matters is revenue from sales.
But, you know, Wall Street and the corporate media: BSers being echoed by BSers.
I recommend listening to this great podcast discussion with Apple Analyst Horace Dediu on this very topic
http://5by5.tv/criticalpath/211
In fairness though, Apple stock almost always falls by about that much right after an earnings call. They pump it leading up to the call, then dump it and take profit afterwards. Each time they use some excuse. This time they’re blaming that Apple is taking away one of their excuses.