Apple reported a small increase in sales and profit for its fiscal second quarter to March, in line with its outlook, while also announcing a big increase in dividends and buybacks for shareholders.
Revenues rose 5 percent year-on-year to USD 52.9 billion, and quarterly earnings increased to USD 2.10 per diluted share from USD 1.90 a year earlier.
Sales of the iPhone rose only 1 percent year-on-year to USD 33.2 billion, and unit sales were down 1 percent compared to a year ago to 50.76 million phones sold. Services revenue continued to grow much faster, up 18 percent to USD 7.0 billion, and revenue from ‘other’ products, notably the Apple Watch and TV, increased 31 percent to USD 2.9 billion.
Mac sales increased 14 percent year-on-year to USD 5.8 billion, while iPad revenues were down 12 percent to USD 3.9 billion.
Apple also announced it will spend another USD 50 billion on shareholder returns and continue paying dividends and buying back shares for at least another four quarters. This means the company will pay out a total USD 300 billion to shareholders by the end of March 2019 since starting the shareholder returns in the second half of 2012.
It already spent USD 10 billion on shareholder returns in the past quarter, out of USD 12.5 billion in operating cash flow, and said it will continue to turn to debt markets to help finance the programme.
As part of the latest enhancement, the company increased its share repurchase authorization to USD 210 billion from the USD 175 billion announced a year ago and approved a 10.5 percent increase in its quarterly dividend, to USD 0.63 per share.
For the fiscal third quarter to June, Apple forecast revenues of USD 43.5-45.5 billion, up slightly from USD 42.2 billion reported a year earlier.
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