The results are in, and they look great-- Apple made a net profit of $111 million last quarter, up a few million from the same quarter a year ago and once again beating analysts' expectations. A quick glance at the headlines at MacSurfer's Headline News shows that media response is overall very favorable: Apple Earnings Shine, Apple Thumps Expectations, Apple Wins Over Wall Street, Apple Ends Fiscal 1999 On A High Note, etc. Congratulations to Steve and the whole crew for carrying Apple through its eighth consecutive Street-beating profitable quarter.

Of course, if you've been paying attention at all, there are a few things that should make you go "hmmmmm." First of all, yes, Apple beat the analyst consensus by several million dollars even if you factor out the one-time gains from sale of stock, etc. But Apple also beat its own estimates by a conspicuously large margin. Remember that earnings warning a few weeks back? The one in which Apple plainly stated they expected to earn only between $75 and $85 million? Well, what happened there? It's not hard to come up with a couple of unflattering scenarios. The more serious, of course, involves Apple's stated plan to buy back half a billion dollars' worth of its own stock; that earnings warning sent shares tumbling almost twenty-five points in a day-- what a buying opportunity! Yes, it's completely illegal to manipulate one's own stock price with false earnings warnings, and while we're certainly not accusing Apple of doing that, it's hard for a paranoid observer not to notice the, shall we say, coincidence. After all, the warning was issued just five days before the end of the quarter, and we find it tough to believe that Apple suddenly earned another $25 million right at the end, there. What, was everyone holding off on buying Macs until the end of the month? Or perhaps money dude Fred Anderson accidentally spilled coffee on one of the sales reports or something.

The other scenario is a shade less diabolical. Let's say Steve and Fred and the crew all got together and saw that Apple was only going to make about $110 million last quarter. Their earlier public estimates placed the profit at about $134 million, meaning that, for the first time in two years, Apple would not be beating Wall Street's expectations. Consternation! Uproar! So the question here is, just how far would Apple go to continue the Street-beating winning streak? Far enough to issue an overly-pessimistic earnings warning designed to lower analysts' expectations to a beatable level? After all, without the earnings warning, those glowing headlines would read more like "Game Over: Apple Fails To Meet Expectations." Just how good a spin doctor is Steve Jobs, anyway?

But theories of nefarious conspiracies aside, we've got a winner in our own Beat The Analysts contest: Menno Vos, who guessed $111 million right on the button. Congratulations to Menno, who will receive the software of his choice from the Baffling Vault of Antiquity™, and thanks to everyone who entered. Stats, analysis, and commentary are available now at the contest page.