The turbulent year of 2020 cast a shadow on the global economy, and Apple today released its first-quarter results for fiscal 2021, using beautiful financial report data to demonstrate the resilience and profitability that the world's largest technology giant should have.

Financial Report Highlights

1. Apple's revenue and net profit in the first quarter of fiscal year 2021 both set historical records and exceeded analysts' expectations. Revenue was $111.44 billion, a year-on-year increase of 21%; net profit was $28.75 billion, a year-on-year increase of 29%. This is also the first time that Apple has achieved a single-quarter revenue of over $100 billion.

2. Although late, the performance of the four iPhone 12 models is very impressive. The financial report shows that the revenue of the iPhone business recorded US$65.6 billion in the first quarter of fiscal year 2021, a year-on-year increase of 17%, which also set another new high since US$61.58 billion in the first quarter of fiscal year 2018.

The boost brought by the new iPhone to the financial report is basically in line with the predictions of many analysts. Previously, JPMorgan analyst Samik Chatterjee said that the long delivery time of iPhone 12 Pro indicates strong demand for high-end products, which also means an increase in average selling price (ASP) and profit margin.

According to a survey by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, the average selling price of iPhone in the US market has climbed to US$873 from US$809 in the same period last year, which means that the high-end iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max have been more recognized by American consumers. The increase in the unit price of iPhone has directly increased Apple's interest rate. The quarterly financial report shows that the gross profit margin has increased from 38.4% in the same period last year to 39.8%.

3. It is worth mentioning that although the iPhone business revenue hit a new high, it accounts for 59% of Apple's five major businesses. The equally excellent performance of other businesses is helping Apple get rid of "iPhone addiction". The revenue status of Apple's five major businesses in the first quarter of fiscal year 2021 is as follows:

丨iPhone business revenue increased by 17% to $65.6 billion;

丨Service business revenue increased by 24.2% to US$15.8 billion;

Wearables, home and accessories revenue increased 30% to $13 billion;

Mac business revenue increased by 21.2% to $8.68 billion;

iPad business revenue increased by 41% to $8.44 billion;

Benefiting from the popularity of working from home and online education, the Mac and iPad businesses continued to maintain strong growth momentum, recording new revenue records of US$8.68 billion and US$8.44 billion, respectively. In addition, Apple's launch of the MacBook and Mac mini equipped with self-developed chips last year also received a good response, attracting a large number of users to upgrade their machines.

The revenue growth of the service business and wearable/home/accessories business is also encouraging. The service business revenue increased by 24.2% to US$15.8 billion, and the number of global platform subscribers exceeded 620 million. Last year, Apple launched the Apple Fitness+ fitness service and the Apple One "family bucket", and its service types have covered different fields such as cloud storage (iCloud), payment (Apple Pay), games (Apple Arcade), streaming media (Apple Music & Apple TV+), health (Apple Fitness+), and software services (App Store).

4. Let’s look at the performance of different markets. The restrictions during the epidemic disrupted the R&D cycle of Apple products. The launch of the new iPhone was delayed by one month compared with previous years. Due to the lack of the new iPhone, Apple’s performance in the last fiscal quarter was mediocre, especially in the Greater China market, which hit a new low since 2014. Apple’s market value briefly evaporated by $100 billion in October last year.

However, Cook expressed optimism about the Greater China market at the time, and now it seems that this optimism has been proven to be correct. Apple's revenue in Greater China in the first quarter of fiscal year 2021 increased by 57% year-on-year to US$21.31 billion, the largest year-on-year growth rate among the five major markets, which is also the best performance achieved by Greater China in recent years.

"We have two of the top three smartphones sold in Chinese cities," Cook told Reuters in an interview, adding that many of Apple's other products and services were also selling well. Cook said Apple's iPhone sales in China came from both switching from rival Android devices and existing customers upgrading their devices. But he said "upgraders in particular are setting all-time records in China."

In addition to the Chinese market, Apple's revenue in North America and Europe also increased by 11% and 17% year-on-year in the quarter. The revenue of the five major markets in the first quarter of fiscal year 2021 is as follows:

丨Revenue in the Americas increased by 11.95% year-on-year to US$46.31 billion;

丨 Revenue in Greater China increased by 56.977% year-on-year to US$21.313 billion;

丨European revenue increased by 17.33% year-on-year to US$27.306 billion;

丨 Revenue in the Japanese market increased by 33.14% year-on-year to US$8.285 billion;

丨Revenue in other Asia-Pacific regions increased by 11.48% year-on-year to US$8.225 billion.

However, such a good financial report did not boost Apple's stock price. As the market had already digested Apple's strong performance in advance, Apple's stock price has risen by 12% since last Tuesday. As of now, Apple's stock price has fallen by nearly 3% in after-hours trading, and its market value has reached 2.4 trillion US dollars.