Economic Observer Reporter Qian Yujuan On October 27, Eastern Time, after the close of US stocks, Apple released its fourth quarter financial report for fiscal year 2022. Data shows that Apple's total revenue in the third quarter was US$90.146 billion, although it hit a record hi

Economic Observer Reporter Qian Yujuan On October 27, Eastern Time, after the closing of U.S. stock , Apple (NASDAQ:APPL) announced its financial report for the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2022 (i.e. the third quarter of 2022).

data shows that Apple 's total revenue in the third quarter was US$90.146 billion. Although it hit a record high in the same period, its year-on-year growth rate bid farewell to double-digit numbers, with only 8.14%; net profit was US$20.721 billion, and 's year-on-year growth was only 0.83%.

"Without the foreign exchange headwind, we could have grown in double digits." Apple CEO Tim Cook (Tim Cook ) believes that the slowdown in revenue growth is mainly related to the impact of the exchange rate that encountered a "foreign exchange headwind of more than 600 basis points" in the quarter.

reporter noticed that, including Apple, overseas technology giants such as Google , Microsoft , Amazon have been affected by the strong US dollar recently. The direct externalization of operating data is that their stock prices are all falling.

Apple closed at US$144.8 per share on October 27, Eastern Time, down more than 3%. After the market closed, the stock price continued to fall after its financial report was issued, with a decline of nearly 5%, and then closed down and turned to a rise until it rose slightly by 0.41%.

According to the situation of each business line, Apple's revenue is still iPhone sales, with revenue reaching US$42.626 billion, a year-on-year increase of 9.67%, slightly lower than previous analysts' expectations.

It is understood that the new iPhone 14 series launched by Apple has only sold 9 days in the third quarter, so the sales of iPhone in the third quarter are still contributed by the iPhone 13 series. Sun Yanbiao, chairman of Chaodian Think Tank, told the Economic Observer reporter that from this perspective, he felt that the iPhone's revenue was "pretty optimistic", but he was worried about the iPhone's performance in the next quarter, "(Apple) will have great trouble."

When consumers' demand for the iPhone 14 series was fully displayed in the fourth quarter, Sun Yanbiao predicted that the iPhone 14 series was released on the backdrop of the overall decline in the global economy of , consumers' demand for replacement is difficult to boost, and iPhone sales will naturally encounter an impact.

In addition, it should be noted that this time Apple has focused the selling points of the new model on the high-end iPhone 14 Pro, which also leaves it with a problem: how to solve the problem of supply restriction?

Tim Cook did not avoid the problem at the financial report communication meeting. He said that the supply restriction of the iPhone 14 Pro has indeed affected the sales scale to a certain extent. However, Apple's CFO Luca Maestri added that the demand for iPhone 14 Pro is strong among new models on sale, "Apple is working hard to meet the demand."

In response to the fact that the above hot-selling products exist in Apple's new iPhone, IDC also pointed out in its quarterly mobile phone tracking report released on October 28, but IDC conducted a survey on the shipments of Chinese smartphone market in the third quarter and found that iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 that were officially shipped in October Plus, "because it has a smaller upgrade compared with the previous generation of products, its attractiveness to consumers is limited." The

IDC report pointed out that in the third quarter, Apple's market share not only increased by 15.1% month-on-month, but also became the only TOP5 manufacturers to maintain positive growth due to a year-on-year increase of 2.5%.

From the financial report, we can see that Apple currently has five major sales markets, of which Greater China revenue was US$15.47 billion, a year-on-year increase of 6.23%. Although the above revenue growth still has room for improvement compared with Europe and America, at present, the Chinese market has become Apple's third largest target market.

is particularly fierce competition for Apple, the iPhone, which supports its core revenue source, in sales in the Chinese market. Tim Cook knew this very well. He also said at the financial report communication meeting that there were already signs that other smartphone companies were coping with the recent decline in demand.

focuses on the Chinese smartphone market, "it continues to be sluggish and it is difficult to recover in the short term."IDC China senior analyst Guo Tianxiang also suggested in the report that all mobile phone manufacturers in the industry should adopt a "pragmatic and cautious" strategy to reasonably and effectively control the inventory level, while maintaining and even increasing the investment of in the research and development of product .

Previously, in response to Apple's official website's measures to reduce prices on iPhones and other products, Tim Cook denied that "it has nothing to do with cleaning up inventory. "Now when talking about Apple's performance in iPhone sales, he still used the term "strong" at the financial report communication meeting.

However, due to the increasing uncertainty about the prospects, since the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic in 2020, Apple has no new performance guidance after the release of its quarterly financial report, and the third quarter financial report is no exception.

" In the third quarter, the company continued to invest in long-term growth plans. "Luca Mestery emphasized that in the past quarter, Apple's activation and installation of equipment hit a record high. In his opinion, this is due to Apple's ecosystem, customer loyalty and sales incentives.

This is reflected in Apple's financial report, not only the growth in iPhone sales revenue, but Apple's Mac computer revenue increased by 25.39% year-on-year to US$11.508 billion; the revenue of wearable devices, home products and accessories also increased by 9.85% year-on-year to US$9.65 billion.