Apple Reports Strong Q2 Results Behind iPhone, iPad Growth

For its fiscal 2013 second quarter ended March 30th, Apple reported a $9.5 billion or $10.09 per diluted share, up from $39.2 billion in sales and $12.30 per share from the same period one year ago. The results surpassed Wall Street's consensus expectations, which had forecast approximately $42.3 billion in revenue with $9.97 per share.

More importantly, perhaps, Apple's iPhone numbers surpassed more analysts' expectations for the quarter. The company sold 37.4 million iPhones, up from the 35.1 million iPhones sold in the second quarter last year. Some analysts had forecast a year-over-year decline in sales of the iPhone, which has seen its growth rate slowed as more smartphone competitors have taken aim at Apple.

[Related: Cook Tackles Five Hot Questions Facing Apple ]

Apple CEO Tim Cook addressed the competitive landscape during the earnings call Q&A session and paid particular attention to Samsung and Google.

"The smartphone market has always been competitive," Cook said. "They're obviously tough competitors, but we feel we have the best products by far. I feel very good about our competitive position."

Apple also benefited from strong iPad sales, which increased 65 percent from 11.8 million units one year ago to 19.5 million units this quarter. Meanwhile, Mac sales were down slightly to 3.95 million units compared to 4 million units sold in the second quarter last year.

While Apple has gone a somewhat long stretch between major product launches -- the iPad Mini and fourth generation iPad were released last November -- Cook said Apple was readying some amazing new hardware, software and services for this fall and 2014.

"We've got a lot more surprises in the works," Cook said. For the third quarter, Apple said it expects revenue between $33.5 billion and $35.5 billion.

In other news, Apple also announced it will add another $55 billion to its capital return program for shareholders. As part of the program, the company increased its share repurchase authorization to $60 billion from the $10 billion Apple initially announced last year, which makes it the largest single share repurchase authorization in history. Apple expects the share buyback to be completed by the end of 2015.

PUBLISHED APRIL 23, 2013