Quarters
Quarters listens to public earnings calls for the human part: the odd sentence, the little flex, the person behind the numbers. Affectionate. A little dry. Not financial advice.
Quarters
Tim Cook’s last call as CEO
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Quarters: Director’s Cut of Apple’s Q3 2026 earnings call.
Tim Cook’s last call as CEO. Best June quarter ever. Stock still slips on supply. Then he thanks the room, and John Ternus barely speaks!
Company: Apple (AAPL)
Call: Fiscal Q3 2026 · July 30, 2026
CEO: Tim Cook (final earnings call) → John Ternus
What we sit with:
• $109.4B June-quarter record / iPhone +22% / Mac +29%
• “Very significant” supply constraints / hundred-year flood on memory
• The farewell: “never been more optimistic”
• Analysts saying goodbye back — including the $108B year vs $109B quarter
Source: public Apple investor webcast.
Commentary + fair-use clips. Not financial advice.
Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@watchquarters
Subscribe to Quarters for more Director’s Cuts of earnings calls.
Each week on quarters we sit with public earnings calls and listen for the human part. These calls are long, mostly numbers and caution language, but every once in a while a person leaks through or tries to. Sometimes the leak is a catchphrase. Sometimes it's a goodbye that almost pretends it isn't one. I'm Terry. And today, Apple, Tim Cook, July 30th, his last earnings call as CEO. He opens like a man who still has one more game to win.
SPEAKER_02Today, Apple is pleased to report $109.4 billion in revenue, up 16% from a year ago and a June quarter record. We were able to achieve this despite supply constraints and sequential foreign exchange headwinds. We continue to see enormous customer enthusiasm for our most popular lineup ever, with iPhone revenue growing 22% from a year ago to reach a June quarter record. We saw so much excitement around the best Mac lineup we've ever had, growing a strong 29% to achieve a June quarter revenue record. Services also set a June quarter record with $30.7 billion in revenue.
SPEAKER_03109.4. Best June they've ever had. iPhone up 22, Mac up 29, services another record. That's a freaking parade of results. And after hours, Wall Street looked at the guide.
SPEAKER_00Second, we expect the impact from supply constraints to increase significantly sequentially. The projected supply constraints in the September quarter affect iPhone, Mac, and iPad. As a result, we expect our September quarter total company revenue to grow between 9 and 11% year over year.
SPEAKER_03Supply constraints, growth cooling to something like 9 to 11%, and the stock slipped roughly 6-7%.
SPEAKER_02Throughout all of it, we will remain guided by our North Star, building the best products and services to enable people to do magical things. It's a special privilege to be part of people's lives in lasting and meaningful ways, helping them to create, connect, and experience the world around them. I couldn't be more excited to watch our phenomenal story of innovation continue to unfold. And I've never been more confident that the best is yet to come.
SPEAKER_03The quick and ugly. Revenue $109.4 billion beat June quarter record. EPS $2.02 up pretty hard. That includes about 11 cents from tariff refunds. Gross margin over 50% with that refund help. Installed base, over 2.5 billion active devices. September guide, revenue growth 9% to 11%. Soft versus what the street wanted. Because FX and mostly supply, he wins the quarter.
SPEAKER_02And so we've we've got we've got a quarter that we're going to be scrambling on the supply side, essentially.
SPEAKER_03The parts department writes the next sentence. That's the episode. Okay, so the antagonist isn't nobody wants an iPhone. The antagonist is physics and dram. He says the quiet part with Tim Cook manners. Demand ran hotter than even their high expectations. iPhone and Mac remarkably better. They're scrambling. Memory is a hundred-year flood.
SPEAKER_02And uh then if you look beyond September, we see the market pricing for memory continuing to increase, uh, which could drive an increasing impact on our business, and we're continuing to evaluate this.
SPEAKER_03We could actually end it on the chips. We won't. Before questions, he does the thing you can't put in a spreadsheet. Final earnings call. John will lead these going forward. Never been more optimistic. Tim is now a man putting his coat on the back of the chair and thanking the room. Analysts start the QA by saying goodbye back.
SPEAKER_04Tim, best of luck. It's been a pleasure working with you over the years.
SPEAKER_03Tim, congratulations on the extraordinary run. Obviously, Tim, uh, known you a long time. I'll really miss you. Which is weirdly tender for a phone full of people who argue about basis points for a living. John Turnus is on the call. Hardware guy. Takes over September 1st. Somebody finally asks him about the competitive landscape, open AI devices, weird phone rumors, the whole circus. That's it. That's the incoming CEO. On the most historic Apple earnings call in years, so much opportunity, focused on our plans. Very excited.
SPEAKER_02Yes, I I think there are enormous opportunities for uh for Apple um moving forward in AI. And you know, I'm I'm so excited about uh Siri AI and kind of where where it is and where it's going. Uh I and I'm excited about the feedback that we're getting there. And of course, the the um the ability to run uh some percentage of uh request uh on device is also uh very strategic and and uh sort of a competitive weapon, if you will.
SPEAKER_03If Tim does a novel, then John does a fortune cookie.
SPEAKER_01Uh reiterate what Tim said, there is so much opportunity for us um with everything that's happening in this space. And so we're just really focused on on our plans and very excited about it.
SPEAKER_03Quirk of the quarter. An analyst points out when Tim joined as CEO in 2011, Apple did about $108 billion in revenue for the year.
SPEAKER_04Ah yes, thank you. Uh Tim, first uh congrats on your tenure as CEO. Uh you joined uh back in 2011 when Apple reported $108 billion in revenue, and you just delivered a quarter of $109 billion, so just an amazing journey.
SPEAKER_03I don't know what to do with that except sit with it. Same number, different planet, thing that actually means something, the business plainly. Apple's machine still prints desire. iPhone cycle hot, MacBook Neo and Pro Pulling, services big, even if a little shy of the dream. CapEx stays relatively light versus the hyperscalar arms race. That's been part of the stock story. And then Tim, the human ending. I'm gonna be gentle here. This isn't the Zuck episode. Tim Cook does not sound on this call like a man performing certainty he doesn't feel. He sounds like a man who already decided the handoff is the point and used the last microphone of the job to bless the next guy and thank the weird little congregation of shareholders and analysts who show up every 90 days. To be honest, Tim kind of sounded like the principal at graduation, proud, careful, already halfway down the hallway.
SPEAKER_02As you know, this will be my final earnings call, and John will lead these calls going forward. The transition is going seamlessly, and I am beyond excited for John to step into his new role and lead Apple into its next era. He is truly one of a kind, and there is no better person to take the helm of the company. As I've said, I couldn't be more confident in his leadership, in our executive team, and in the extraordinary people at Apple who are determined to enrich the lives of our users all over the world.
SPEAKER_03That's the character this week, not a ticker, a throat saying goodbye without making a scene. I'm Terry. If you like this, please subscribe to Quarters. No stock tips, just the human part. See you next print.