Tech: Apple stock surges to all-time high as forecast hints at strong sales boost (AAPL)

Apple will report earnings for its fiscal third quarter on Tuesday after the market closes.

Apple stock is surging after it beat Wall Street's expectations for earnings per share and revenue, and the stock is up 4.5% after-hours.

Apple also issued strong revenue guidance for its fourth fiscal quarter, suggesting strong sales growth year-over-year.

The strong guidance also hinted at the launch of a redesigned iPhone in September, which is expected to sell briskly.

Although CEO Tim Cook had warned that iPhone sales might see a "pause" ahead of the expected September launch of the new iPhone, iPhone unit sales were in line with Wall Street expectations and in line with last year's performance.

Notably, Apple sold 14% more iPads than it did a year ago, breaking a 13-quarter streak of year-over-year declines. However, revenue was only up 2% on an annual basis, suggesting that many of these sales were of the less expensive $329 iPad Apple introduced during the quarter.

Here are the key results:

Q3 EPS (GAAP): $1.67, up 17% year-over-year, vs expectations of $1.57

Q3 revenue: $45.4 billion, up 7% year-over-year, vs expectations of $44.95 billion

Gross margin: 38.5%, up 1% year-over-year, vs expectations of 38.2%

iPhone unit sales: 41.0 million, up 1% year-over-year, vs expectations of 41.1 million

iPad unit sales: 11.42 million, up 14% year-over-year

Mac unit sales: 4.292 million, flat year-over-year

Q4 revenue guidance: $49 billion - $52 billion vs expectations of $49.21 billion

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Apple will report earnings for its fiscal third quarter on Tuesday after the market closes. Read Full Story