Apple posts highest ever fourth quarter results

Oct 18, 2011, 20:58 GMT

San Francisco - Apple posted its highest ever fourth quarter revenues and earnings Tuesday as record sales of Macs and iPadd enabled it to continue its rise.

The company, which is still mourning the death of founder and former CEO Steve Jobs earlier this month, posted quarterly revenue of 28.27 billion dollars, compared to 20.34 billion dollars a year ago, while quarterly profit rose to 6.62 billion dollars from 4.31 billion dollars.

International sales accounted for 63 per cent of the quarter's revenue, Apple said.

Apple's sales of iPhones rose 21 per cent to 17.07 million in the quarter, while iPad sales reached 11.12 million, a 166 per cent increase. Apple sold 4.89 million Macs during the quarter, a 26-per-cent increase over the year-ago quarter.

But sales of iPod media player dropped 27 per cent to 6.62 million as customers preferred iPhones.

'We are thrilled with the very strong finish of an outstanding fiscal 2011, growing annual revenue to 108 billion dollars and growing earnings to 26 billion dollars,' said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. 'Customer response to iPhone 4S has been fantastic, we have strong momentum going into the holiday season, and we remain really enthusiastic about our product pipeline.'

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