by bintangkecil on Monday, October 19th, 2009 | Business, News | No Comments

Apple Inc. on Monday reported a 46% increase in its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings as the company posted higher revenue than a year ago led by better-than-expected sales of iPhones, Mac computers and iPods.

Apple said it earned $1.67 billion, or $1.82 a share, on revenue of $9.87 billion. During the same period a year ago, Apple earned $1.14 billion, or $1.26 a share, on $7.9 billion in sales.

Apple’s results topped the estimates of analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters, who had forecast the company to earn $1.42 a share on revenue of $9.2 billion.

The initial reaction to Apple’s report was strong enough to send the company’s shares up more than $12, or as much as 6.5%, in after-hours trading to $202.20 after earlier rising $1.81 a share in the regular market session.

The company sold 7.4 million iPhones during the quarter ended Sept. 26. It was the first full quarter of sales for the iPhone 3GS, Apple’s latest version of its touchscreen smartphone that starts at $199. Analysts were expecting iPhone sales of 7 million, on average.

Apple also said it sold more than 3 million Macs during the quarter, thanks in part to the back-to-school selling season. Mac shipments increased by 17% from the same period a year ago. Analysts had been expecting Mac sales of 2.8 million. During the quarter, Apple released Snow Leopard, the latest upgrade to its Mac operating system.

“It was a strong, strong quarter,” said Shaw Wu, who covers Apple for Kaufman Bros. “[The] big upside was driven by Macs and iPhones. This was amazing despite very high expectations, and we’re still in the middle of a recession.”

The company said it sold 10.2 million iPods during the quarter, which was an 8% decline in shipments from the year-ago period. However, those results still exceeded the 10-million shipment figure that was expected from many Wall Street analysts.

Gross margins as a percentage of revenue climbed to 36.6% from 34.7% in the same quarter last year.

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