the Groovie

Apple announced record Mac and iPhone sales and its most profitable quarter ever in its Q4 2009 earnings conference call today.  Apple® today announced financial results for its fiscal 2009 fourth quarter ended September 26, 2009. The Company posted revenue of $9.87 billion and a net quarterly profit of $1.67 billion, or $1.82 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $7.9 billion and net quarterly profit of $1.14 billion, or $1.26 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 36.6 percent, up from 34.7 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 46 percent of the quarter’s revenue.

The Company posted revenue of $9.87 billion and a net quarterly profit of $1.67 billion, or $1.82 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $7.9 billion and net quarterly profit of $1.14 billion, or $1.26 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 36.6 percent, up from 34.7 percent in the year-ago quarter.

Jobs also noted that the company has some “really great new products in the pipeline for 2010.” Tablet, anyone?

As always, the most interesting comments happen when they open the conference call to questions. When asked about competition for the iPhone in the holiday season (i.e. Android), Apple responded:

Almost 21 million for the fiscal year sold now in terms of iPhones, so we have momentum. Plus the App Store with 85,000 apps is so far beyond anyone else. We feel good about competing with anyone. I think people are still trying to catch up with the first iPhone, announced 2 years ago. We’ve moved beyond that.

Management believes investors will benefit from greater transparency in referring to these non-GAAP financial measures when assessing the Company’s operating results, as well as when forecasting and analyzing future periods. However, management recognizes that:

• these non-GAAP financial measures are limited in their usefulness and should be considered only as a supplement to the Company’s GAAP financial measures;
• these non-GAAP financial measures should not be considered in isolation from, or as a substitute for, the Company’s GAAP financial measures;
• these non-GAAP financial measures should not be considered to be superior to the Company’s GAAP financial measures; and
• these non-GAAP financial measures were not prepared in accordance with GAAP and investors should not assume that the non-GAAP financial measures presented in this earnings release were prepared under a comprehensive set of rules or principles.

You can listen to a rebroadcast of the call in QuickTime, it will be posted later as a podcast in iTunes.