Apple beats forecasts as profits surge

The company, which sold almost as many of its new iPad tablets as Mac computers, said revenues jumped 61 per cent to 10.3bn in the second quarter.

Profits rose 78 per cent to 2.1bn.

With the company lifting its revenues guidance for the current quarter, Apple shares rose more than three per cent in after-hours trading in New York.

Apple said it sold 8.4m iPhones, an increase of 61 per cent from last year, even though the company stopped shipping more of the previous-generation iPhones after the updated model, the iPhone4, was announced in June. It sold 1.7m units of the iPhone4 during the last three days of the quarter.

It also sold about 3.3m iPads during its first three months on the market. This compared with 3.5m Macs after sales of the computers rose 33 per cent due to record levels of business with schools and colleges.

Apple's strong performance contrasted with fellow technology firm Yahoo, which disappointed Wall Street with sluggish revenues growth.

Cost cuts meant second quarter earnings increased 51 per cent to 139.6m, but analysts said revenues growth of two per cent was disappointing given Google last week announced a 24 per cent improvement over the same period.

Both Yahoo and Google make virtually all of their money from online advertising, a sector that has been recovering faster than other forms of marketing.

Around 29 per cent of Yahoo's revenue comes from outside the United States, with Europe accounting for less than 9% of the total.