MSFT vs. AAPL Earnings

Ahead of this Thursdays Microsoft earnings (consensus is at 55 cents / share or ~$4.76 billion), a comparison of Microsoft's quarterly earnings (in billions) to Apple's.



I'll leave the fundamental analysis for those smarter than me, but as can be seen:

1) Microsoft still out-earns Apple
2) That earnings gap is decreasing rapidly as Apple's earnings growth have been nothing short of astronomical
3) Microsoft earnings have been nothing to sneeze at, up more than 13% annualized over the past four years (June '10 vs June '06) despite the economic slowdown
4) You can buy a dollar of Microsoft earnings for a bit more than $12 or about half the price of Apple's (this does not make Apple rich; it just means Apple better keep growing at a fast clip)

Source: Daily Finance