Apple blows away estimates selling 15.43 million iPads

Apple has announced financial results for its fiscal 2012 first quarter which ended December 31, 2011. The Company posted record quarterly revenue of $46.33 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.06 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share.

These results compare to revenue of $26.74 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 44.7 percent compared to 38.5 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 58 percent of the quarter’s revenue.

The company sold 37 million iPhones, 15.43 million iPads, 5.2 million Mac computers, and 15.4 million iPods in the quarter.

Wall Street was expecting revenue of $38.76 billion and 10.07 EPS. Analysts also expected that Apple would sell 30.2 million iPhones, 13.2 million iPads, 5 million Macs and 15.5 million iPods.

The 15.43 million iPads units sold is up from the 11.12 million iPads the company sold in the previous quarter. It’s also an 111 percent increase from the year-ago quarter when it sold 7.33 million units.

The revenue from Apple’s iPads reached 9.153 billion which is now the second largest segment for Apple. The iPhone accounted for 24.417 billion in revenue and Macs are the third highest at 6.598 billion.

Apple has now sold over 55 million iPads since it launched in April of 2010.

This was another exceptional quarter for Apple. Apple is up over 8% in after hours trading reaching an all time high of 454.10 up over 33 points. The stock closed at 420.41 before the earnings release.

Originally posted 2012-01-24 21:51:01.