Live blog: Apple’s fiscal year Q4 2016 earnings call

Just moments ago, Apple reported its earnings for the fourth quarter of 2016 and now the company is preparing to hold a conference call with investors and reporters to discuss the Typically, Apple CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri give a deeper look into the results, while questions will also be taken from analysts and investors.

In case you missed it, Apple reported $46.9 billion in revenue and $9 billion in profit for the July to September quarter, while iPhone sales came in at 45.5 million, iPad at 9.2 million, and Mac at 4.8 million. Of note, the company’s Service’s sector was up 24 percent for another all-time high, though China spelled trouble, down 30 percent year over year.

As usual, we’ll have live coverage of Apple’s earnings call in this post. The call will begin at 2PM ET/5PM PT. Tim Cook will likely speak first, followed by Maestri. The Q&A session will round out the call.

Check out all the details from the call below and you can tune in for yourself at this link.

• Full coverage of the earnings report is here.
• You can listen on Apple’s investor relations website, but we’ll put the highlights here.
• And we’re off…Tim Cook leads things, Luca will come second, followed third by Q&A
• Tim Cook: Starts by teasing upcoming Mac event…’customers going to love’ what Apple announces on Thursday
• ‘Very strong’ Q4 numbers
• iPhone up in sales in 33 countries
• More Android to iPhone switchers in Q4 than ever before
• Expects ‘rapid’ adoption of Apple Pay in Japan, teases Spain launch in ‘next few months’
• Apple Pay transactions up 500 percent year-over-year
• More Apple Pay transactions in Q4 than all of 2015
• ‘Thrilled’ with iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus reception, ‘best’ iPhones ever
• ‘Demand continues to outstrip supply,’ but working to get devices into customers hands as quickly as possible
• Apple Watch Series 2 ‘off to a great start’
• 100 HomeKit compatible products by end of year
• Touting India performance, up over 50 percent in fiscal 2016 compared to 2015 still room for growth
• Talking Deloitte partnership, Apple’s continued emergence into enterprise
• ‘As we close the book on another incredible year,’ Cook thanks employees, developers, investors
• Luca Maestri: Canada, Latin America, Europe, Middle East, South Asia show strong iPhone sales
• China sales down, but reaction to iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus gives reassurance for Holiday quarter
• iPhone ASP $619 in Q4, in line with expectations
• Strong ‘double digit’ revenue growth in several Services categories
• Mac sales face difficult year-over-year comparaison
• Largest Mac install base ever at end of September quarter, ‘some exciting news for current and future Mac owners very soon’
• iPad revenue flat, accounts for over 80 percent of tablet market over $200
• Talks IBM enterprise partnership, more on that here
• 4 acquisitions during the September quarter
• Teases ‘return to growth’ with Q1 2017 holiday quarter, predications can be found here
• Cash dividend of $.57/share
• Q&A time…
• Q: Thoughts on yearly iPhone upgrade numbers?
• Cook: Carriers that had upgrade plan show that demand is robust, worldwide case is ‘demand outstripping supply’ so hard to tell immediately
• Q: What about Apple’s plans for a Car?
• Cook: Can’t speak about rumors, but Apple looks for ways to improve customer experiences, clear that there are lots of technologies that will become available or will ‘revolutionize’ the car experience, but nothing to announce today
• Q: iPhone supply equilibrium by end of quarter?
• Cook: For iPhone 7, yes, but not for iPhone 7 Plus
• Q: What should we read into R&D doubling?
• Cook: Products in development face that have not reached market factor into R&D budget, emphasis on Services and doing things to improve that experience
• Q: More on China?
• Cook: Full year shows China down 17 percent year over year, but 2014-2016 revenue grew 43 percent, 2016 hurt by devaluation of currency by 3 percent…largest reason for decline is surge of upgraders in 2015, so when upgrade rate returned to normal in 2016, it ‘had further to fall’
  • Still ‘very bullish’ on China, ‘booming’ middle class and LTE adoption still growing slowly…’continue to have a really good opportunity in China’
• Q: Thoughts on acquisition?
• Cook: ‘We look at a whole variety of companies,’ but look for companies that bring something to improve user experience
• Q: Is television still an area of interest for Apple? What about recent acquisitions?
• Cook: ‘An intense interest to me and many other people here… in terms of owning content and creating content… we have started with focusing on some original content…we have a few things going there… I think it’s a great opportunity for us… it is an area that we’re focused on’
• Q: Balance AI and privacy focus? What about dedicated home assisant?
• Cook: ‘Most people would like assistant with them all the time… we live in a mobile society and people are constantly moving from home to work and to other things they may be doing. The advantage of having an assistant on your phone is that it’s with you all the time. That’s not to say there’s not a nice market for a home one, but usage of one on the phone will be much greater.’
  • 2 billion requests a week for Siri and ‘to best of our knowledge we’ve shipped more assistant enabled devices than anyone out there’
  • Shouldn’t have to choose between AI and privacy, might take longer but there is a solution there
• Q: Does Apple has a grand strategy for what it wants to do over next 3-5 years? Or does it react to the market then decide?
• Cook: ‘We have the strongest pipeline we’ve ever had and we’re very confident about what’s it, but we won’t talk about what’s in it. We have a strong sense of where things go and we’re very agile and able to shift where people need to.’
• Q: Move to continue to increase ASP with iPhone 7 Plus?
• Cook: The mix that Apple projected with iPhone 7 Plus is short of what is reality…’we want to charge a fair price, don’t want to charge more than that’
• Maestri: Have to keep in mind world economy fluctuations, as well
• Q: Carrier incentive effect on iPhone upgrade?
• Cook: There’s a lot of competition for customers right now, but might not happen every two years
• Q: Could India be as big of an opportunity for Apple as China?
• Cook: Important to look at per capita income, but also at number of people that are or will move into the middle class over the next decade, as well as age of population. One reason for slow smartphone adoption in india is lack of infrastructure, but ‘enormous’ investments happening with 4G this year…government focused on creating jobs and building infrastructure
  • Clear that population in India will exceed China in next decade, but will take longer for GDP to rival…middle class will ‘really’ want a smartphone and there’s a lot of ‘headroom’ there
• Q: