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Apple Computer (Nasdaq: AAPL) Corp. (Nasdaq: APPL) was up 0.937 at 17.75 in early trading Thursday after the computer maker, as expected, reported a loss for the first quarter ended December 30th.
Company officials were optimistic about the future, however, predicting a return to profitability in the current year as it gets rid of excess inventory.
Apple said it lost US$195 million, or 58 cents per share, compared with a profit of $183 million, or 51 cents, in the year-earlier quarter. Revenue fell 57 percent from a year earlier to $1 billion, and gross margins were negative 2.1 percent, compared with 25.9 percent previously.
"We took our medicine last quarter and brought our channel inventories back down to about five and a half weeks," said Apple chief executive officer Steve Jobs. The company, he said, is starting the New Year "with a bang," shipping new products in January, February and March.
"Our cash position remains very strong at over $4 billion, and we are planning a return to sustained profitability beginning this quarter," said chief financial officer Fred Anderson. Revenue for the year as a whole will be about $6 billion, he said.
Apple said it shipped 659,000 Macintosh computers during the quarter, with international sales accounting for 49 percent of revenue.
Apple and other computer makers are dealing with a slowdown in demand for personal computers. In December, sales were down 24 percent from a year earlier, according to PC Data.
Last month marked the fifth consecutive year-over-year decline for the sector, and the
second month of double-digit drops, according to PC Data. For 2000 as a
whole, PC sales dropped 0.8 percent, the first decline ever.
