APPLE posted the largest quarterly earnings of any company, ever, yesterday. It made $18.4 billion in profit in the three months to December 26th 2015, beating the record it set a year earlier by a few hundred million dollars. But that’s in the past. The word on the street is all about how Apple will fare next quarter. Thanks to turmoil in emerging markets, chiefly in China, where it makes a quarter of its sales, quarterly revenue is expected to fall by about 11% year-on-year. That would mark the end of a remarkable run for Apple—51 quarters of consecutive year-on-year revenue growth—just as it nears completion on its $5 billion new HQ.

苹果公司昨日公布了其高于任何公司的当季收益。截止到2015年12月26号的这三个月中，苹果公司收益为184亿美元，比其前一年所创纪录高出几亿美元。但那是过去了。现在大街上贴着的新闻都是关于苹果公司在下一季度将如何进展的消息。由于来自于主要发生在中国这样的新兴市场的动荡(苹果公司产品的销量有四分之一来自于中国)，苹果公司的季度收益预计将同比下降11%左右。那将会终结苹果公司的运营神话——连续51个季度的同比增长——而此时苹果公司也即将建成其耗资50亿美元的新总部。

Apple’s fortunes are dominated by the iPhone, from which it earns around two-thirds of its revenues. Over the past ten years the company has sold 900m iPhones, compared to: 350m iPods, 300m iPads and 140m Macs. The much-hyped smartwatch has sold perhaps 12m-15m units since it was launched in April, earning around $4 billion in revenue. Nevertheless, Apple can now boast a new landmark: one billion active devices over the past 90 days. Add to that a $150 billion cash-pile—the “mother of all balance sheets” in the words of Tim Cook, its boss—and the company remains in rude health.

苹果公司的财富来源主要是iphone，而iphone几乎给苹果公司公司带来了三分之二的收益。在过去的十年间，苹果公司销售了9亿部iphone，3.5亿部iPod，3亿台iPad，1.4亿台Mac book。大肆炒作的智能手表自4月份上市以来，也只售出了1200~1500万部，为苹果公司带来了大概40亿的收入。尽管如此，苹果公司现在可以吹嘘其新的里程碑了：在过去90天内售出了10亿部有源器件。除了这所带来的1500亿现金总额之外——引用Tim Cook的话，“所有资产负债表的妈妈”，也就是苹果的老总——以及整个公司，都依然势猛如牛。