Apple Inc. beat Wall Street expectations and posted earnings of $11.03 billion, or $2.10 per share, in its fiscal second quarter, according to a release published on Tuesday. This is compared to $10.52 billion, or $1.9 per share, registered a year earlier.
Revenues came in at $52.9 billion, up from $50.56 billion recorded during the same period a year earlier, and against a $52.97 billion analyst consensus. Apple sold 50.76 million of iPhones and obtained $33.25 billion in revenues during the fiscal second quarter, compared to 51.19 million units and $32.86 billion recorded a year ago. Revenues from services increased to $7.04 billion from $5.99 billion.
The Cupertino-based company also announced the highly-anticipated $50 billion update to its capital return program, raising the share repurchase authorization to $210 billion from $175 billion from a year ago, and increasing the quarterly dividend by 10.5% to 63 cents per share.
"We’ve seen great customer response to both models of the new iPhone 7 (PRODUCT)RED Special Edition and we’re thrilled with the strong momentum of our Services business, with our highest revenue ever for a 13-week quarter," said Apple's CEO Tim Cook in a statement.
Apple's stock closed 0.67% higher at $147.51 as the world's most valuable company hit record market capitalization at $775 billion before reporting its quarterly results. Analysts expect the stock to open at $150 on May 3 with a "buy" consensus.
