By Radarr Africa Business Desk
LAGOS, November 3 (Radarr Africa) – Apple reported record revenue of $114.5 billion for its fiscal fourth quarter, up 12 per cent from a year earlier, but its shares fell as investors focused on slowing growth, according to the company’s results and US market reports.
In its results for the quarter ended September 26, released on Monday, Apple said diluted earnings per share rose 14 per cent to $2.10. The company said earnings per share included a $0.05 benefit from tariff refunds. Gross margin was 47.9 per cent, which Apple said included a benefit of roughly one percentage point from tariff refunds.
The release described September-quarter records for iPhone revenue and an all-time high for Services revenue, without giving dollar figures for individual segments. Apple said fiscal 2026 revenue was an all-time record of $479 billion, with double-digit growth in earnings per share.
Chief executive John Ternus said Apple was proud to report a September-quarter revenue record of $114.5 billion, up 12 per cent from a year ago, according to the release. Chief financial officer Kevan Parekh said: “Apple delivered September quarter records for net income and EPS.”
On cash, Apple reported $28 billion in operating cash flow in the quarter and said it returned $28 billion to shareholders. The board declared a quarterly dividend of $0.27 a share, payable on November 16, 2026, according to the release.
The results beat expectations. TheStreet reported that analysts had expected revenue of $113.47 billion and earnings per share of $2.00. Even so, the shares came under pressure. TheStreet said Apple fell about 1.83 per cent during Monday’s session and was down about 1 per cent after hours, and attributed the decline to decelerating growth.
Stock Titan reported a steeper after-hours fall, of about 2.8 per cent at 7:59 p.m. Eastern Time, and said a weak gross margin forecast had pushed shares lower. Radarr Africa could not confirm the forecast figure from the sources reviewed, which did not state it.
The results came on a day when US stocks were mixed. TheStreet reported that the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 0.41 per cent while the S&P 500 fell 0.51 per cent and the Nasdaq fell 1.07 per cent. Markets had opened higher after the previous session’s technology sell-off, in which the Nasdaq had its worst single-day drop since June, but gave up the gains by the close.
Before the results, TheStreet noted that Apple’s exposure to large-scale artificial intelligence infrastructure spending is relatively limited compared with some of its peers. Amazon and Alphabet had disappointed investors with their own results the previous week, according to the report, and concerns about heavy AI spending contributed to the sell-off on Friday.
The tariff refunds are a notable part of the quarter. Apple’s own release attributed $0.05 of the $2.10 earnings per share, and about one point of the 47.9 per cent gross margin, to refunds. That means that without the refunds, on the company’s own figures, earnings per share would have been about $2.05 and gross margin about 46.9 per cent. The release did not say what the tariffs related to or whether further refunds are expected.
Apple’s fiscal year ends in September, so the $479 billion figure covers the twelve months to September 26, 2026.
