Apple and Facebook have reported shocking increases in their earnings and revenue in the fourth quarter of 2020, the latest sign that tech companies were a lifeline for pandemic-hit consumers around the world.
The quarterly results of the two giants of Silicon Valley They underscored how consumers relied on social media, digital services and electronic equipment as they became confined by the global health crisis.
Mighty apple
Apple announced a strong advance in its quarterly earnings as well as a record billing in three months, for the first time higher than 100 billion dollars.
The manufacturer of the iPhone obtained net profits of $ 28.7 billion in the first quarter of its fiscal year 2020-2021 -the one of Christmas sales-, an increase of 29% compared to 2019. The group’s income reached the astronomical sum of $ 111.4 billion.
“We are grateful for the enthusiastic response from our customers to our unparalleled line of cutting edge products that we deliver in a historic holiday season,” said the CEO. Tim Cook.
Apple said the sales of iPhone represented almost $ 66 billion, leading all the other products of the company and growing 18%.
But the tech giant also saw strong growth in wearable devices, including its Apple Watch, which generated $ 12.9 billion in sales. Services accounted for 15.7 billion as Apple increased sales of music, digital content, cloud archiving and subscriptions.
The power of advertising
Facebook for its part, it billed more than $ 28 billion, mainly from advertising, in the last quarter of 2020, and had a net gain of 11,220 million dollars53% more than in the same period of last year, due to the explosion in the use of social networks during the pandemic.
“We had a very strong close to the year as the public and businesses continued to use our services in these challenging times,” said the CEO and founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg. The number of users increased even more during the holidays.
As of December 31, 3.3 billion people frequented at least once a month one of the group’s four platforms and messaging (Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp), according to a statement published on Wednesday.
But the company foresees “headwinds” this year because of the increase in data confidentiality on the brand’s devices. Apple, he indicated. This can affect the display of targeted advertisements for users.
The dispute between the two tech giants centers on changes in the Latest version of operating software Apple’s iOS, which includes a tracking transparency feature that, depending on Facebook, will cripple your ability to serve targeted ads.
“Although the moment in which the changes will take place iOS 14 remains uncertain, we would expect to see an impact from the end of the first quarter, “he said. Facebook.
Last month, the social media giant opened fire on Apple, saying that the iPhone maker’s new measures on data collection and targeted ads would affect small businesses.
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