Macs
How many Macs did Apple sell last quarter?
April 13, 2013: 12:21 PM ETGlobal PC sales may be in free fall, but most analysts expect the Mac's to be up a bit
Chart: WSJ
Chart: PED. Click to enlarge.
FORTUNE -- For a company like Apple (AAPL) that is supposed to be a growth stock, the flattening bar graph at right might seem like a disappointment -- unless you consider the alternative, represented by the chart at left.
According to IDC's grim report Thursday, PC sales were down worldwide by 14% year over year, the worst fall-off on record and the fourth straight quarter of declines. Gartner's estimate wasn't much better: it measured a decline of 11.2%, the worst drop it's seen since 2001.
Both firms attributed the shrinkage at least in part to the disruption caused by the growing popularity of Apple's iPad and its imitators.
In that context, the estimates of Mac sales that have come in so far from 57 Apple analysts -- 34 professionals and 23 amateurs -- look quite cheery.
The median estimate -- 4.1 million Macs -- is 2% higher than the 4.017 million Apple sold in the same quarter last year.
The high estimate of 4.61 million Macs -- offered in January by J.P. Morgan's Mark Moskowitz -- would represent 14.7% growth.
The low estimate, ironically, comes from Topeka's Brian White, whose price target for Apple is a Street-high $888. He's calling for Mac sales of 3.19 million units, down 20.7% from last year.
We'll find out who is closest to the mark when Apple reports its fiscal Q2 2013 earnings on April 23.
Below: The individual analyst's estimates -- pros in blue, independents in green. Thanks once again to Posts at Eventide's Robert Paul Leitao for pulling together the Braeburn Group numbers.
Chart: PED
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Don't expect to find Macs, iPhones or iPads at Staples
The tweets that launched a score of news stories may have been premature
FORTUNE -- The Street's Rocco Pendola was tearing his shoulder-length locks Wednesday morning in a piece titled I'm Worried About Apple. Again. And You Should Be, Too. The thrust of his story: Tim Cook is diluting the precious Apple (AAPL) brand by allowing its products to be sold by retailers associated with, in his word, "mediocrity."
Pendola mentions BestBuy (BBY), MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 20, 2013 11:41 AM ET -
Mac hacker attack reminds us why Steve Jobs hated Java
The programming platform Oracle inherited from Sun continues to plague Apple
FORTUNE -- "Java's not worth building in," Steve Jobs told the New York Times' John Markoff in 2007. "Nobody uses Java anymore. It's this big heavyweight ball and chain."
To Jobs' regret, Java did not disappear. The write-once-run-anywhere programming platform that Sun Microsystems developed and Oracle (ORCL) inherited continues to drag Apple (AAPL) down.
On Tuesday, with foreign hacker attacks on U.S. MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 20, 2013 6:30 AM ET -
Analysts cautious ahead of Apple's earnings release
Lowered expectations after Tim Cook's Tuesday bombshell
FORTUNE -- On Monday, Wall Street's consensus for Apple's (AAPL) fourth quarter report -- scheduled to be released today after the markets close -- was for earnings of $8.85 on sales of $36.32 billion.
By Thursday, according to Thomson Financial, those numbers had dropped to $8.75 and $35.8 billion. And among some of the analysts who revised their estimates this week, expectations were even lower.
What MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 25, 2012 7:57 AM ET -
Why do we still mourn Steve Jobs?
A scientific explanation of Apple users' unique grief a year after his death.
By Jennifer Abbasi, contributor
FORTUNE -- In the weeks following the death of Apple's CEO and co-founder one year ago today, more than a million people sent emails to an address set up by Apple (AAPL). Messages on blogs, Facebook (FB) and Twitter, and even makeshift in-store memorials, demonstrated a collective sadness at the Apple co-founder's passing. And MORE
Oct 5, 2012 5:00 AM ET -
Mac set to outgrow the Windows market for 25th quarter in a row
PC sales have stalled, but most analysts believe Mac unit sales grew 12% to 14% last quarter
FORTUNE -- According to Gartner and IDC, the worldwide personal computer market -- including both Microsoft (MSFT) Windows PCs and Apple (AAPL) Macs -- shrank by 0.1% in the June quarter, although the two research firms disagree about whether Mac sales grew or not. (See here.)
Our panel of 61 analysts -- 27 from Wall MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jul 13, 2012 6:47 AM ET -
Apple gives the Gray Lady the cold shoulder
A lesson in access journalism in the wake of the New York Times' Foxconn series
"An Apple spokesman said no executives were available to comment."
That sentence, appearing 12 paragraphs into a 14-graph story by Brian X. Chen in Thursday's New York Times, speaks volumes about how Apple (AAPL) deals with press coverage it doesn't like.
For more than a week, the company had been seeding selected media outlets with early access to its next MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 17, 2012 7:18 AM ETPosted in: Access journalism, Apple, Daring Fireball, Foxconn, Macs, Mountain Lion, New York Times, OS X, PCs, Phil Schiller, Tim Cook, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post -
Our Apple whisper numbers
Averaging the Q1 2012 estimates of the six analysts with the best track records
Whisper numbers, according to Wikipedia, emerge from widening cracks in the spreadsheets maintained by Wall Street analysts. Quoting an article by Daniel Svensson, the entry explains:
"When the estimate is first calculated by sell-side analysts, the number is submitted to companies such as First Call to be averaged with other analysts' estimates for the consensus earnings estimate. As MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jan 23, 2012 6:19 AM ETPosted in: Apple, Daniel Svensson, Earnings Smackdown, iPad, iPhone, J.P. Morgan, Katy Huberty, Macs, Mark Moskowitz, Mobile, Morgan Stanley, PCs, Quarterly earnings, Tablets -
Steve Jobs and Me: A journalist reminisces
Fortune contributor Brent Schlender shares some of the stories and personal photographs he collected during more than two decades as Steve Jobs' chronicler and confidant.
FORTUNE -- Most of us who wrote in depth about the brilliant career of Steve Jobs sooner or later came to realize that we were complicit in the making of a modern myth. You simply couldn't avoid it. And while it is true that Jobs was MORE
Oct 25, 2011 5:00 AM ET -
The Apple Store is back up
With OS X Lion, a new MacBook Air and a new MacBook mini
In Wednesday's apple.com splash screen, Apple (AAPL) is highlighting "the new, faster MacBook Air."
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jul 20, 2011 8:50 AM ET
