Apple quietens Wall Street’s fears of China struggles and slow AI progress

Tech giant sees double-digit revenue rise, with huge gains in iPhone sales, despite stock-price drop and looming tariffs

Apple has been under pressure this year. It's playing catch-up to its fellow tech giants on artificial intelligence, it's seen its stock fall by double digits since the year began, it closed a store in China for the first time ever this week, and looming US tariffs on Beijing threaten its supply chain. On Thursday, the company released its third-quarter earnings of the fiscal year as investors scrutinize how the iPhone maker might turn things around.

Despite the gloomy outlook, the company is still worth more than $3tn, and it beat Wall Street's expectations for profit and revenue this quarter. Apple reported a huge 10% year-over-year increase in revenue to $94.04bn, and $1.57 per share in earnings. That's substantially more than the $89.3bn in revenue and $1.43 per share that analysts predicted and is the company's biggest revenue growth since 2021.