Apple, Amazon and Alphabet's earnings report

Apple, Amazon & Alphabet: disappointing earnings

The A-Team’s results are in, but their plan hasn’t come together. 

Apple posts first revenue fall in 13 years

The fruity giant made $117 billion in revenue last quarter, but that’s $4 billion shy of what was expected from the world’s largest company. Shares fell by more than 3% after the news.

The iPhone was the main culprit, which missed its targets by a staggering $3 billion, making this Apple’s biggest decline since 2019. 

Apple boss Tim Cook said they were navigating a “challenging environment”, as he blamed supply shortages due to Covid-19 and a weak economy from the war in Ukraine. 

It’s not all doom and gloom however, as some products like the iPad still managed to flourish. It outperformed expectations by almost $2 billion. Services like Apple Pay and Apple News also drove growth, performing 6.4% higher than this time last year. 

Apple has been quoted as ‘dangerously dependent’ on the iPhone in the past, and so investors may be feeling optimistic that other parts of the business are finally driving growth. 

Amazon cloud services are short by $460 million

Amazon shares also fell 3%, after its cloud service failed to meet targets by $460 million. A tough year ended on a difficult note with an annual net loss of $2.7 billion. CEO Andy Jassy has tried to calm investors, saying he “remains optimistic about the long-term opportunities for Amazon.” 

Question is, do the investors? It’s likely they will be wary that Amazon’s share price has declined 47% in 2022 thanks to a slowdown in digital advertising, high inflation and rising interest rates. Like many companies, Amazon’s growth was supercharged by the pandemic, but the recent economic reality has sent the stock careening back to Earth. 

This is Amazon's first loss since 2014 and the company's largest annual loss on-record.

Alphabet’s advertising misses by $4 billion

Alphabet tops the list with falling share prices, having slipped 5%. It experienced its second ever economic decline in its latest earnings, as revenue slipped 4% thanks to Google ads falling $4 billion short of what was expected.

So how did Alphabet get its ABCs mixed up?

  • Google's ad revenue in Q4 2021 was $61.2 billion, but in Q4 2022 it was $59 billion thanks to brands have shrinking budgets

  • Analysts had estimated YouTube ad revenue would be $8.2 billion, but it fell short at $7.9 billion for the same reason 

  • Google Cloud didn't do too well either. It lost $830 million, although it is a better result than the $1.7 billion it lost in the same quarter last year.

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James Ashoo

Senior Content Writer

James has been investing for over five years. His aim is to explain the hard stuff, easily! When he's not chewing your ear off about stocks and crypto, he'll most likely be telling bad jokes.

Harjas Singh

Harjas Singh

Chief Product Officer & Co-Founder

With a wealth of experience in fintech, Harjas is the man in the know when it comes to all things product. Investing features, chatting capabilities and thriving communities – he oversees all development on the Shares app!

Harry Harrison

Harry Harrison

Finance Writer

Harry is an experienced business writer, with a love for all things tech. In his free time, he enjoys reading, playing sport and winning at chess. He also loves posting inside the Shares app!