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Evercore ISI analyst Amit Daryanani raised his target price for Apple stock from $ 135 to $ 145.
Mladen Antonov / AFP via Getty Images
Wall Street is getting more optimistic about it
Apple‘s
upcoming earnings report.
Earlier this week, I took note of a number of analyst notes looking ahead to Apple’s December-quarter financial results (ticker: AAPL) and lifting their estimates and price targets. At the end of Wednesday, Evercore ISI analyst Amit Daryanani agreed, reiterating his Outperform rating as he raised his target price on the stock from $ 135 to $ 145.
As with the phone calls from Canaccord and earlier in the week
Swiss credit,
Daryanani raised his expectations for the quarter, which will likely be reported in the last week of January. And like his colleagues, he mentioned strong early demand for the more expensive versions of iPhone 12.
In driving estimates, Daryanani points to a combination of better-than-expected unit demand and higher-than-expected average sales prices as consumer demand evolves for the more expensive Pro and Pro Max versions of the new phone line. He also notes “better growth in services,” seeing more than 30% growth in downloads from the App Store.
“It is important that we not only see that demand remains robust [the December quarter] but also expect the upward force to maintain [the March quarter]Given the longer delivery times for the iPhone 12 Pro and, to a lesser extent, the Pro Max, he writes.
“The iPhone Pro has been shipped for two and a half months now, and our analysis suggests that turnaround time remains high in every country we track, except the US,” Daryanani writes. He says Apple is offering same-day delivery on the iPhone Pro in the US with a dedicated carrier service that costs an additional $ 10, but that standard delivery still requires a 21-day wait, a modest improvement from the 33-day wait at the US. get started. from December.
He notes that in China, delivery times for the 12 Pro have fallen from 23 to 16 days, but still the longest turnaround time 10 weeks after launch for any iPhone in history. He notes that the base iPhone 12 and 12 Mini have shorter delivery times in all regions, “which could indicate a strong mix of more expensive iPhone 12 Pros.”
The Evercore analyst is looking for $ 104 billion in revenue and $ 1.43 per share in earnings for the quarter, above the Street consensus of $ 102 billion and $ 1.40 per share. He sees 80 million iPhone units this quarter, with an average retail price of $ 775.
Apple shares were up 1.2% to $ 128.17 during recent trading. The
S&P 500
was up 0.9%.
Write to Eric J. Savitz at [email protected]