Apple sees healthy profits in fourth quarter

 

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By Matthew Sparkes

Posted on 23 Oct 2007 at 08:31

Apple has announced that in the last quarter it sold a record 2,164,000 computers, over 10 million iPods and 1,119,000 iPhones, bringing the total number of handset sales to 1,389,000.

Healthy sales have seen revenue of $6.22 billion in the fourth quarter, ending September 29, and profits of $904 million. In the same quarter, 40% of sales were outside the United States.

"Apple ended the fiscal year with $15.4 billion in cash and no debt," says Peter Oppenheimer, Apple's CFO. "Looking ahead to the first quarter of fiscal 2008, we expect revenue of about $9.2 billion and earnings per diluted share of about $1.42."

A range of new iPod models was released during this quarter, but many, such as the iPhone and touch, are still not available in Europe. This bodes well for the company if, as expected, iPhone sales are as healthy outside the US as they were in the company's home country.

"We are very pleased to have generated over $24 billion in revenue and $3.5 billion in net income in fiscal 2007," says Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. "We're looking forward to a strong December quarter as we enter the holiday season with Apple's best products ever."