UPDATED 14:24 EST / AUGUST 02 2018

APPS

In a milestone first, Apple’s market cap passes $1 trillion

After seeing its stock price steadily rise over the past two days, Apple Inc. today hit a market capitalization of $1 trillion and thereby became the first U.S. company ever to reach the valuation.

The iPhone maker’s shares passed the crucial $207.05 mark this morning and finished at $207.39 by the end of Thursday, up just under 3 percent. The milestone followed a jump of more than 5 percent on Wednesday.

It’s all thanks to the strong third-quarter results that Apple posted Tuesday afternoon. The iPhone maker saw earnings per diluted share jump 40 percent year-over-year $2.34, which easily beat the consensus analyst estimate. Revenue, in turn, exceeded expectations as well after climbing 17 percent to $53.3 billion. Both figures set new records for the company.

The company’s growth came despite the fact that iPhone shipments increased a mere 1 percent in the third quarter to 41.3 million units. What helped offset the flat growth is the premium-priced iPhone X model, which sells from $999.

Apple’s earnings were further aided by the strong performance of its services division. The group, which includes the App Store and the AppleCare support line among other offerings, saw revenues climb 31 percent to $9.5 billion.

Holger Mueller, principal analyst and vice president of Constellation Research Inc., told SiliconANGLE following the earnings report that the services division is only set to become more important for Apple. 

“If you ever doubted that Apple is going to thrive or die with the iPhone, this quarter has put all doubts to rest,” Mueller said. “Now it is all about monetizing the platform with services, and that has to move from a ‘nice side revenue’ to a key revenue driver for Apple.”

Wall Street has tempered expectations for Apple’s growth going forward. According to data from financial analytics provider FactSet Research Systems Inc. that was cited by CNBC, analysts on average expect shares of the iPhone maker to increase 1.8 percent over the next year. Apple’s shares rose 31 percent in the past 12 months.

The iPhone maker will end up significantly trailing other tech giants in share price growth if the forecasts prove accurate. Amazon.com Inc., which is the second-most valuable U.S. firm with a $882 billion valuation as of today, is expected to rise 18 percent on the stock market by next August. Facebook Inc., in turn, is projected to gain 20 percent during the same period.

Photo: Wikimedia

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