Some highlights on the Conference Call

Yesterday we provided you real-time transcript of Apple's Q4 financial results conference call, here is some information we'd like to point out:

Q4 Results:
Apple posted a net profit of $430 million and revenue of $3.68 billion. Annual profit is $1.33 billion while revenue for 2005 is $13.93 billion. All of these figures are historic records for the company.

iPod nano demand:
iPod nano demand was qualified as "staggering" by Tim Cook during the conference. Apple sold 1 million iPod nanos during the first two weeks after its release. Apple could not give a timeframe of when the company will be able to meet demand for this product but remains confident. Apple did not want to disclose margin and component supply related information.

iTunes:
iTunes Music Store has more than 80% of the U.S. market share. The online store reached breakeven and made a slight profit this quarter. Apple's strategy for iTunes remains the same,the company sells music so as to sell iPods.

Mac OS X Tiger:
Apple sold $35 million worth of Tiger copies during the quarter, this is by far the most popular release of Mac OS.

Macs/Intel switch:
Apple sold over 1.2 million Macs this quarter (602 000 desktops and 634 000 laptops). The company's inventory level for Macs is very low at the end of this quarter. Apple claims this inventory level is due to higher demand than expected. Apple is confidend about demand until its first Intel-based Macs arrive and sees no impact of the Intel switch announcement at the moment.

Retail stores:
Apple had more than 50 million visitors on its retail stores this year and plans to open another 35 to 40 locations during 2006. On October the 15th a new store is opening at Staten Island, NY.

This quarter's forthcoming announcements
Tim Cook said Apple is excited about the products its going to announce this quarter. It also said that current iPod line was launched last year and perormed well. He also implicitely said that it's time to launch a new iPod line to drive December and 2006 sales.

Guidance:
Guidance for Q1 2006 is a revenue of $4.7 billion. Apple did not provide details on how the guidance has been projected.