No supply problems

Apple (AAPL) shares fell in the postmarket Thursday after the company's quarterly report disappointed investors. Apple expects strong sales in the holiday quarter, but cites huge amounts of losses due to a global chip shortage.

Shares of Apple (AAPL), up 15% since the start of 2021, fell 3.5% in the postmarket Thursday after the company missed market analysts' average forecasts for quarterly sales for the first time since 2018.

Apple pointed to strong demand in fiscal Q4, but limited supply of its products due to an industry-wide chip shortage and production disruptions by its Southeast Asian suppliers that were tied to COVID.

CEO Tim Cook said product supply constraints reduced Apple's sales by about $6 billion.

He said that while the company had seen "significant improvement" at its Southeast Asian facilities by the end of October, chip shortages persist and are now affecting "most products."

In addition, Apple's fourth fiscal quarter ended Sept. 25 and so included only a few days of iPhone 13 sales and did not include sales of the new MacBookPro line and AirPods introduced in October.

Apple's report compared with market analysts' forecasts

Earnings per share rose 70% from a year ago to $1.24 and were in line with analysts' forecasts, but below the previous three quarters.

Total sales revenue rose 29% to $83.36 billion, but came in below Wall Street's average estimate of $84.85 billion.

iPhone revenues were up 47% from a year earlier to $38.87 billion, but fell short of market forecasts of $41.51 billion.

Mac revenue rose just 1.6% to $9.18 billion and fell short of forecasts of $9.23 billion, which may be because consumers were expecting new products in October. iPad revenue rose 21.4% to $8.25 billion.

Revenue from other products (Apple Watch, AirPods, accessories) rose 11.5% to $8.79 billion, below forecasts of $9.33 billion. Service revenue (Apple Music, iCloud, TV+ and others) rose 25.6% to $18.28 billion. According to Cook, this is higher than the company expected. Apple reported 745 million paid subscriptions, which includes not only its own services, such as Apple Music, but also subscriptions through the Apple App Store.

For all of fiscal 2021, Apple generated $365.8 billion in sales revenue compared to $274.5 billion last year.

Apple's net income for fiscal 2021. 2021 nearly doubled to $94.68 billion from last year's $57.4 billion.