The National Times - Amazon, Apple beat expectations in gloomy earnings season

A crowded period of results from the world's biggest tech firms has been marked by misses and uncertainty -- making it clear that the pandemic-era boom has tipped toward downturn.

Amazon beat sales estimates to reach $121 billion in the quarter, and revenue climbed at its cloud-computing platform Amazon Web Services, which brought in $5.7 billion. The market responded with a 12-percent jump in after-hours trading.

For Apple, product sales tallied $63.4 billion in a drop from the same period a year earlier, but the dip was more than made up for by services revenue that climbed to $19.6 billion, earnings figures showed.

"Our June quarter results continued to demonstrate our ability to manage our business effectively despite the challenging operating environment," Luca Maestri, Apple's CFO, said in a statement.

Recession fears, a strong dollar, shrinking advertising budgets and inflation -- headwinds are coming from every direction at the moment.

"Amazon managed pretty well through the second quarter despite tough macro conditions and added costs weighing on its bottom line," said analyst Andrew Lipsman.

Microsoft and Facebook-owner Meta both cited the harm to their business from a strong dollar: when America's currency gains too much value, it can make products more expensive overseas or eat away at a beneficial exchange rate.

The social media giant pointed to the greenback's role in the firm's first year-on-year revenue decline since going public in 2012.

- Not much good news -

In addition to the generally bumpy economic times, firms such as Netflix and Meta are fighting fierce competition from rivals -- and both reported losing some ground.

Meta lost about two million monthly users between quarters, and Netflix shed nearly a million paying customers, which was less than expected.

Yet Netflix stock is up about a percent in the past five days, with investors potentially hopeful after the firm projected a coming rebound in subscribers.

Markets seemed similarly assuaged despite Google parent Alphabet missing on revenue and profit.

The Silicon Valley giant's bad news was not unexpected, as the flow of online ad dollars that fuels the company's fortunes has slowed as inflation, war and other troubles vex the overall economy.

"Still, with its tremendous market share in search advertising, Google is relatively well positioned to weather the rough waters that lie ahead," said analyst Evelyn Mitchell.

As advertisers have tightened their belts, and Apple's privacy changes have bitten into firms' sales of costly but highly targeted ads, the damage was uneven.

Meta's income has taken a beating, and with a share price that has lost about half its value since February, it's clear that investors are still wary about the company's future.

Analysts noted Meta's reported 14 percent drop in average price per ad was a steep change coming on top of the first quarter, when ad prices dipped 8 percent.

"The good news, if we can call it that, is that its competitors in digital advertising are also experiencing a slowdown," said analyst Debra Aho Williamson.

Snapchat's parent firm, for example, reported that its loss in the recently ended quarter nearly tripled to $422 million, despite revenue increasing 13 percent under "more challenging" conditions than expected.

"We are not satisfied with the results we are delivering, regardless of the current headwinds," California-based Snap said in a letter to investors last week.

A.M.Murray--TNT