LittleBITS: Should We Continue Covering Apple Financials?

Feel free to explain your vote below, and please share any suggestions you have for making the articles more interesting or relevant.

I generally hear about AAPL results from any number of sources. If you want to reduce coverage, maybe it would make sense simply to note that results were announced or to make note only when there are surprises.

That said, there probably is a good chance that one of your readers will start a thread independently if there are surprising results. Therefore, if you are trying to optimize your focus, dropping coverage of AAPL results entirely is perfectly reasonable.

My feelings exactly!

I liked your post with the charts. I used to prefer more detail that you’ve provided here, but know I find you’ve get the sweet spot—for me!

Honestly I see Apple results from so many other sources - Jason Snell on Mastodon and his sixcolors site, macstories, John Gruber, etc. - by the time TidBits posts that it’s generally unnecessary for me to have TidBits post the stories as well. But I don’t mind the posts, either. I’m ok either way.

I’m not really into the nuts and bolts of Apple finances, and seldom look elsewhere for the details, but I find your coverage to be interesting without being excessive.

Sort of the same thing… I never look at them on any source, so I wouldn’t miss them. Said another way: If there is significant financial news about Apple, there will be a news article to catch my attention and that’s enough for me.

Simply reporting the numbers isn’t terribly meaningful to me, but if other interesting information accompanies those numbers (unexpectedly high or low sales for a particular product or market sector), that could be interesting.

But if the report doesn’t include anything that you’d find interesting, I’d be OK with skipping it.

I find Apple financial news interesting (when delivered in the fashion of the main TidBITS article–readable and informative but not necessarily so detailed as to cause eye-gloss and cure insomnia). Not in the way a financial analyst might, but simply “how are things going at home, Friend?” sort of way. I am not a hater of Apple. I like my Apple products. As much as I would trust any large corporation, I trust Apple on the things that matter to me. I don’t mean to be off-topic, but I work on an 11-year-old iMac at work, whereas my Windows colleagues have gone through replacements every three years, and my office has a contract with a desktop-assistance group at a high monthly cost–one that my Windows colleagues call on regularly, and I’ve used once to help solve a network issue. The Apple products I have purchased have worked and been reliable. I would retire immediately if forced to use a different platform, because the learning curve would not be worth it to me. So I consider Apple to be like the San Francisco Giants or the San Francisco Forty-Niners. While I am not a sports fan, I like to see how they’re doing in a given year. And the quarterly financials tell me “well, they’re only 3 games out” or “if they can beat the Giants, they’ll win the Division.” Whatever those terms mean. They sound encouraging (or not, in down times). But the having the information comforts me, even if it has no impact on my actions.

I see the numbers in various places. But I like these articles because of the analysis and the perspective they offer — that I cannot get in many other places, or at least not at this level of quality. The graphics are very nice and the length is usually just right for me. I like that they’re not as dry as typical financial analysis, perhaps because they’re authored by Mac geeks who understand tech and Apple no less than they understand financials.

I read (and usually enjoy) every one of them and usually also end up following the links you and others supply after the fact to articles by Snell, Gruber, and others on the topic. I doubt I’d come across those without the initial TidBITS article though. I cannot check 20 Mac sites a day, but TidBITS I do.

I voted no, but I actually the summary for this quarter to be quite useful. Probably because I skipped checking Six Colors yesterday. I do think you guys did a better job of boiling down the results, but I find the Tidbits coverage less essential here than on other topics. I could easily rely on Six Colors.

Jason Snell’s coverage is excellent and timely and, honestly, even as someone who’s been reading TidBITS since 1993 or 94, it’s not all that interesting (not like it was in the “Beleaguered ” days.

I voted ‘yes’. I’m not particularly interested in the numbers as they are, but context and some analysis. My problem, if you will, is that I don’t read other Apple-related sites. I get my Apple news from TidBITS and TidBITS Talk. So, a bit of analysis of Apple’s results is welcome.

I don’t think I’d miss it (or even notice) if TidBITS stopped covering Apple financials, but I do quickly read the articles when they come out. By contrast, I pretty much skip all such articles from other sources. I do appreciate the TidBITS perspective, so I voted Yes.

As an Australian based shareholder I don’t see a lot of local news coverage of Apple’s financials. I need to specifically go looking for it.

I like seeing it reported here on Tidbits and it often means I also visit 6 colours.

If all TidBITS did was report results with no analysis or commentary, I wouldn’t be too interested because Apple is widely covered by both financial and non-financial media. But I like the current synthesis of results and expert user comments (as opposed to financial analyst and social media influencer pronouncements).

Oh dear, but this is what I really want to say:

“ADAM, IGNORE THE NO VOTE!!”

Your commentary is the most interesting part. The overview and charts setup the commentary.

Articles about Apple’s financials are a very, very big reason I’m such a big TidBits fan.

I agree! I find earnings reports from many other sources, including the WSJ and Apple Insider.

I like the financials (quarterly) reporting on TidBits: It’s gives a good overview/analysis of what is happening at Apple. If I need more details, I suppose I could do some digging online elsewhere, but the TidBits summary for me is usually sufficient.

Not sure at this point how the reporting could be improved.

A new Apple product that didn’t seem to be getting much, if any, mention of any significance Vision Pro from the press before, during and after the latest financials were released.

My guess is that Vision Pro is not delivering the sales. There aren’t many significant apps produced by Vision Pro developers, if there are or were any. It’s not like iPad, iPhone, Music, AirPods, Apple Watch, head sets, Apple TV and programing, etc.,etc., etc. have been raking in the cash since the days they were released. And the headsets, goggles, etc. aren’t cheap to manufacture either.

Should We Continue Covering Apple Financials?
Yes please. You mentioned Six Colors. I don’t think I ever visit there. Perhaps once or twice a year at the very most? Ditto Gruber, WSJ, etc. TidBITS features in my RSS feeds - they don’t.

Reading over the previous comments here, I think @Halfsmoke hit the nail on the head, for me, with “expert user comments”.

As a stockholder, I’m interested in any info available from all sources.

Why would it? Prior to release the analysts were anticipating about 400,000 in sales in the first year, based on the high price and product constraints (the tiny screens on the Vision Pro are in short supply).

Then when the pre-orders were high they doubled that, only to retreat back to the original number when sales tapered. So basically we are where we expected, which isn’t bad. But even at $3500 a pop that’s not going to move Apple’s very large financial needle (only about $350M per quarter).

Them not mentioning doesn’t say to me it’s not been a success. I wouldn’t read much into it. It’s best to think of Vision Pro as a developer’s kit and not a mainstream product.

I fully trust Adam and the others here at TidBITS. Please continue, because you frequently are a handrail that gives me trusted opinions and realities against which I can interpret other analyses.

I think covering the financials is part of TidBITS’ fundamental job. In times like these where the financials are generally very good and stable, it may seem duplicative of other sources, but there will be times when the financial condition of the company affects its operations and TidBITS should maintain its own ongoing credibility in anticipation.

I typically do not pay attention to financial analysts reporting on financial results because their audience is shareholders and investors. I much prefer your approach as you look for things in the results report from a product or user perspective the analysts often ignore or just don’t get. (Remember how they just didn’t get why people loved their Macs because of quality and longevity issues when Apple stock was valued lower than their cash on hand–they just didn’t get it).

Here’s what actually happened:

According to Ming Kuo, “ 1. Apple has cut its 2024 Vision Pro shipments to 400–450k units (vs. market consensus of 700–800k units or more).

2. Apple cut orders before launching Vision Pro in non-US markets, which means that demand in the US market has fallen sharply beyond expectations, making Apple take a conservative view of demand in non-US markets.

3. Apple is reviewing and adjusting its head-mounted display (HMD) product roadmap, so there may be no new Vision Pro model in 2025 (the previous expectation was that there would be a new model in 2H25/4Q25). Apple now expects Vision Pro shipments to decline YoY in 2025.”

This does look like Apple is rather desperate about Vision Pro.

Current vote is 49% to 51%. Can’t you Americans vote strongly one way or the other?

That’s the revised estimates after that same analyst doubled his original estimate. From this article last February “…analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says U.S. shipments of the Apple Vision Pro are expected to be 200,000–250,000 units this year.”

Kuo says this and then just a few months later he reports that expected sales are only going to be 400-450K down from some mythical 700-800K? The new “low” numbers are double his original prediction!

It’s all clickbait headlines.

The bottom line is that none of this matters. Even if Apple were to sell a million Vision Pros, it’s peanuts compared to Apple’s other revenue. It’s a niche product and will be for a while, which means we can’t read into sales numbers (or Tim not mentioning it during quarterly results) to predict its fate.

Any time a financial “analyst” references “market consensus”, you should ignore the entire article.

“Market consensus” is whatever the writer wants it to mean. It implies that there actually is some kind of consensus, which isn’t always the case. And even if there is, it’s just a summary of what other pundits have been saying - pundits who don’t have any more insider information than the rest of us. The fanbois will have glowingly high expectations and the haters will predict doom and gloom. Any “consensus” you may find is simply going to be a function of how many pundits like Apple vs those that hate Apple, and none of it means anything.

“Market consensus” is whatever the writer wants it to mean. It implies that there actually is some kind of consensus, which isn’t always the case.”

“ What are Consensus Estimates and Why are they Important?”

“https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/what-are-consensus-estimates-and-why-are-they-important

And VisionPro ain’t exactly like when Steve Jobs pulled in “1984” results, when Steve Jobs had to go into extra super overdrive to build many thousands and thousands more Macs that the market was demanding.

I am fond of everything you choose to publish. With more and more “news” hidden behind paywalls or AI noise generators, your direct reporting is relevant.

I always enjoy Adam’s associated commentary, so I’d like to see it continued. But if it is discontinued, will that mean we’ll have one less article per quarter, or will the time required to report on the financials be devoted to another topic of interest?

I think that article says the same thing I said. It’s an average of projections by lots of pundits who don’t have access to any more information than anyone else.

Unless their answer is so obvious that a blind squirrel could figure it out, you’re really just summarizing the biases in the pundits’ opinions.

And since there is no fixed set of pundits comprising this consensus (every news outlet has their own cherry-picked set of experts that they reference), I maintain my opinion that it means whatever the writer wants it to mean.

Nasdaq may put some fancy language in an article, but it all boils down to the same thing.

That having been said, consensus numbers are meaningful. Not as an accurate prediction about how a company will perform, but as a driving force behind stock prices, since people make investment decisions based on these consensus numbers, right or wrong. And when the real numbers end up differing from the consensus, higher or lower, the price quickly swings from one based on the prediction to one based on reality. Which is why these swings are called “corrections” in marketspeak.

WRT Apple’s manufacturing of AVP (or any other specific product), they have the exact sales numbers, updated every day (if not more frequently), along with the exact quantities manufactured. And they have their own experts analyzing their markets. All data that is confidential and is not reported to the public except as a part of SEC-mandated reports, and even then, usually aggregated with all other products.

In other words, Apple is making decisions based on their private numbers, while pundits (who comprise “the consensus”) are basing their decisions on old data and news articles that may or may not prove to be relevant. A good analyst may come closer to being right than a bad analyst, but none of them have the information necessary to make a truly informed decision.

I voted “no” because I am more interested in technology trends and the use of various technologies than financial details. But I do find the trends interesting and useful.

The comments I find most interesting here are on something not mentioned in your analysis – the status of Vision Pro. I am much more involved in optics than in computer science, and over the years I’ve seen repeated efforts to bring 3D imaging and Augmented Reality to the mainstream. Anybody remember 3D TV or Microsoft HoloLens? Vision Pro is another product in that line, an alluring concept with serious limits arising from the nature of the human eye. The eye has to work hard to produce the 3D effect. It looks fine for a few minutes, but your eyes get tired. Canadian tests said soldiers should not use HoloLens for more than 30 minutes because after that point eyestrain became a serious problem. It’s a fundamental limit of the human eye that our technology has been unable to solve and tech companies keep beating their heads against.

I just have to say that I hugely appreciate all the kind comments about our Apple-expert/financial-dabbler analysis.

And yes, I meant to say something about the Vision Pro (and I’ll go add that now), but it was conspicuously absent from anything resembling numbers.

I won’t die of grief if I don’t see your reports – but on the other hand, I don’t care much for financial reports from financial types. :-) Getting perspective from people who care about Macs, not about the exact price of Apple’s stock, is a much more interesting way to learn. But I’ve no dog (or investment fund, as it may be) in this fight.

I voted yes, but do not feel at all strongly. Jason’s charts are awesome, but frankly there is so much detail that I usually read the first couple of screenfuls and then skip to the conclusion. I think I must be in a small minority when I say that quarterly financial reports are not news. I feel the same about poll results and reports on which-candidate-managed-to-fundraise-more.

Still, I’m invested not only in the ecosystem but in Apple stock as well, and it’s useful and interesting to see a non-financial perspective on the financial “news.”

Bottom line: I think you should do as your heart dictates, Adam!

I don’t care enough to bother with Apple’s announcements. Nice to see a quick summary without having to go to the trouble of looking for it.

I figure these are of more interest to those who play the stock market. Being on a fixed income, I stay away from that.

There are other options for me to see the results but TidBits does sort of hit the sweet spot for me. Sort of a high level overview of the highlights without getting into minutiae that wouldn’t really mean much to me.

“As a stockholder, I’m interested in any info available from all sources.”

Apple is such a secretive company, I always appreciate your taking time to share your thoughts about what you believe is going on… sharing your perspective - your ‘TidBITs’ as it were :)

i.e. Please continue convering Apple’s Financials.

TIA

This is literally The only place I read about Apple financial updates, please keep it up!

I find your financial reviews of Apple contain just the level of information I want. I do read them.

Most other reviewers are either trying to make “their point” or they get too deep in the weeds.

Keep it up, if you can stand it.

I find the details interesting and prepared in a form that is fun to read.

I like reading your summaries. Most of the time, I get the financials from you guys and I think you do a pretty good job in layman’s terms to pass on the information.

Given my—to put if kindly—modest financial circumstances despite (or maybe because of) 40 years deep in the Silicon Valley trenches, I get a kick out of these numbers, like watching with morbid interest a speeding train going faster and faster, half sure the engineer knows what he’s doing at that crazy pace, but also half sure he can’t possibly continue like that without derailing…and yet, so far, his train crazily speeds on and on.

Some of us have the same reaction to the ongoing, always upward indebtedness of the domestic and world economies, or in the words of the late Illinois Sen. Everett Dirksen (a socially progressive Republican!), “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money!” Today, just slide the decimal point over and make that “a trillion here and a trillion there”—nothing ever really changes. So yes, Adam, please do continue reporting on Apple’s and everyone else’s crazy funny money—it’s the best show in town!

I always see this info at Daring Fireball. I don’t identify at all with the company’s finances, though I think that for some people the feeling is something like that of identifying with a sports team — “we” are winning, or losing, or whatever.

But that bizspeak in what you quoted from Tim Cook is hilarious. It reminds me of the strange pleasure of listening to the BBC Shipping Forecast. No idea what it means, but it’s oddly compelling.

The total volume of the articles could be a half.

Though I’m very interested in Apple’s financials (I started buying a bit of AAPL every month when Steve Jobs returned), the basic information is available via many sources and by the time I see it in TidBITS, it’s old news. I find charts rather pointless and I don’t get why people like them (I skim the ones on Six Colors, but I rarely find them informative).

What I do find valuable and interesting is analysis about what the latest numbers mean for Apple in the future. In the 1990s when every article described Apple as “beleaguered” it’s refreshing to know that Apple won’t disappear overnight, but there are still trends that the markets dictate, such as certain product lines, the schedule of new products and updates, and so on. I don’t know that these articles need to appear every quarter, however. Once or twice a year is probably all that’s needed, similar to an annual or bi-annual physical from your doctor.

But all that said, the financial articles don’t bother me if they are published by TidBITS.

While not interested in the details, the overview is useful as it serves to indicate if Apple is listening to its customers, creating products that people wish to purchase and at a price that they are willing to pay for it.

I don’t care about Apple financials at all. They make a lot of money. I understand that. I don’t need to read articles about it.

I find your summaries very helpful and interesting. Unlike some others here I guess, I don’t subscribe to many other blogs / newsletters / feeds (I have been trying to cut down), so I would be sorry if you stopped doing these! They are just the right length for me too.

My relatively tiny IRA investment in Apple in the late '80s while working for a third tier Apple developer led eventually to a rewarding (NOT financially, sadly) career in software development. It was that few thousand dollars invested in Apple stock that eventually gave me a healthy IRA and made a comfortable retirement possible. I still find all things Apple fascinating, very definitely including their financial ups and downs! Please continue your coverage.

Adam, it’s terrific as it is. Please retain the financial reporting and commentary.

Keep it. I find it mildly interesting but would never seek it out. I guess that’s to say I trust this source and it’s one of the few I still let in to my inbox week after week. So when the finance rundown is there I’m happy to see it just as I am all the articles (even though honestly, most of them are probably of limited immediate value to me, just as AAPL’s numbers are)

To be honest, Adam, I don’t look elsewhere for Apple Financial figures. Your graphs, charts and analysis are fine for my level as I’m a ‘Big Picture’ preference person. Although I’m a Mathematician, I’m not a financial expert, so find your statistics presentations the fastest way to see how Apple’s fortunes are doing. Please keep it up!

IDEA: Use your current favorite AI tool to summarize the financials and your commentary in the style of any 18th century author. Share the prompt and the summary.

Or some similar mashup.

I don’t read much Apple press, so I really enjoy a TidBits finsummary.

I don’t muck around with AI as much as I should, so maybe this will help alleviate some AI FOMO.

I enjoy taking a quick look at the TIDBITS summary of Apple’s quarterly financials. Since I rarely see any financial news, I would probably no see Apple’s results at all if I didn’t see them here.

I think the question is why this is relevant to most of Apple’s customers, and the only answer I can come up with is that it is important to see how well Apple’s different segments do relative to each other. So all I’m really interested in is a line chart that plots iPhone, Mac, iPad, etc. against each other, because that tells me something about Apple’s future behavior (e.g. the more Services revenue goes up relative to the Mac, the more ads for it I’ll probably see in Mac OS).

I think it’s useful to have these reports. After all it’s quarterly not daily or weekly. You don’t have to be a financial geek to read a quarterly report. It does seem to me that some basic awareness of Apples financials is helpful to anyone interested in Apple. And if you really are not interested, you can just read a different article.
tmansheim

I said yes, but it could be a briefer “wrap-up” or Graphic sidebar with links to outside more concise reporting… It may be harder to report Tidbits without Apple financials being at the ready. They are repetitive, indeed - Interesting how there’s a covid uptick that Apple has maintained and you can see that quite plainly in a graph. Apple stock performance is something else!

I tend to skip the financials, my interest in Tidbits is about using Apple products.
Perhaps there’s room for some analysis of the implications of the financials, for example: iPad revenues are down for the seventh year running raising the risk that iPads will be discontinued (should that unthinkable ever occur!), but the financials themselves are of no interest to me.

We invest via 401k, IRA, brokerage accounts, pensions, etc. into thousands of companies. I do not follow any of them for paper making tips or spark plug factories or diaper tech or farm equipment.
Best leave financial aspects with those experts and publications and stick with just Apple tech. Users before investors.

I think your time is better spent on other things. The numbers are covered endlessly everywhere else. I think TidBITS’ should not spend any time on financials.

Yes, please. I like your KISS style of reporting the Apple Quarterly Reports (Keep It Simple, Stupid). Anything else about Apple I can read on the news sites.

I get my apple news from TidBITS, so I’d be disappointed if the financials were eliminated. I do gloss over some of the results sometimes, but enjoy your commentary on the call/results even when it’s ‘well this is a bit repetitive.’

Please continue showing the charts breaking out the percentage of each line of business ( services, mac, iphone etc. ) . The summary of the results is helpful too. I could find these results elsewhere but not so neatly packaged and easily consumed. Thank you!

All the charts and graphs are pretty, but the details have already been published other places by the time they come out in TidBITS. I agree with josehill’s comments about saving space and maybe just note surprises.

The financials are of little interest to me, though any specifically interesting tidbits would be fine. I’m much more interested in market share numbers. On the other hand, the Category Revenue pie chart is interesting, just to predict what Apple is likely to focus on, and of course Mac sales deltas.

So, I guess keep it, but maybe add market share graphs (which I realize wouldn’t come from Apple)?

Adam, your joy is my joy.

I would like to see a summary of key numbers. Jason’s is too detailed for me. I also think graphs showing historical trends, e.g., growth in services, would be useful. I mean a single graph will all products or areas as lines in different colors.

I voted “No” - not because the coverage is not useful, but because I have access to coverage of Apple financials elsewhere (e.g. financial newspapers and Above Avalon) - but I appreciate the commentary.

If you like reporting on this, you should keep reporting it. Don’t worry about repetitiveness or the fact that this information is somewhere else. You can make that criticism of weather reporting and the folks who do that maintain a high level of engagement with that subject every single day!

When they’re repetitive, I’m not much interested. Any extremely unusual aspects of the financials would be worth covering.

We are long time Apple stock owners. My wife listens to the conference calls. But we both read your summary, and for me you are the only source. She will give me a very high level review but your report has all the numbers, she doesn’t keep notes. I send them along to her and she appreciates them as well.

I look at the financial highlights. Apple is a good investment.

I seldom have the time to read about the results in other stories, so I appreciate your high-level recaps, which continue to give me insight into how Apple is doing, without a lot of ancillary commentary about the stock price and its gyrations. Thanks!

I appreciate your succinct and insightful coverage of Apple’s financials. I’m mildly interested so your coverage is just what I want. I voted Yes. Keep up the good work!

Dare I mention that sixcolors.com does all this so well, as most Apple geeks may know already. Perhaps it may be better to just headline the main bullet points, and give a link or links to Jason Snell’s super-well executed article he does each period.