By Jason Snell for Macworld

July 28, 2021 7:17 AM PT

Even iPhone chip shortages can’t slow down Apple’s money train

Among the things Wall Street likes are growth—always growth—and certainty. This past year has provided a lot of uncertainty, both in life and in business. And while Apple has done well over the last year—its latest financial results included $81 billion in revenue, the best third quarter in the company’s history—it’s also been uncertain about its future.

Once again, Apple’s executives have declined to forecast the company’s results for the next quarter. However, they were willing to predict that it would see “very strong double-digit year-over-year revenue growth” that will be lower than this quarter’s year-over-year growth rate of 36 percent. (That’s actually some guidance, albeit of the broad variety; it means next quarter’s revenue will be between $71B and $88B.) But overall uncertainty remains, about the progression of the COVID pandemic, about foreign exchange headwinds, about increased shipping costs, and most notably about whether Apple will be able to get enough component parts to make iPhones as iPhone season approaches.

Here are some of the more interesting things that I noted in Tuesday’s results and the post-results conference call that Apple CEO Tim Cook and Apple CFO Luca Maestri hold with a bunch of Wall Street analyst types.

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