Apple posts quarterly results - Updated

Apple has posted its financial results for the third quarter of 2011, hitting revenue and profit records and selling a whopping 17 million iPhones, despite customers knowing full well an upgraded iPhone was just around the corner.

The company posted quarterly revenue of US$28.27 billion and net profit of US$6.6 billion, compared with US$20.34 billion and US$4.3 billion in the previous quarter.

17.07 million iPhones were sold, representing 21% growth over the same period of 2010. Apple also sold 11.12 million iPads, 4.89 million Macs, and 6.62 million iPods.

You can read the full report here.

Update: Apple CEO Tim Cook says the company was expecting a greater drop-off in iPhone sales in the third quarter, given the level of anticipation for the new device media were speculating would arrive alongside iOS 5 and iCloud.

"We're confident we will set an iPhone record this quarter," Cook said in a conference call announcing the results.

"There was much less of a reduction [in the third quarter] than we were expecting. We knew there was great anticipation of a June or July new iPhone because that was the pace we've been on for several years.

"The reduction was largely in the back half of the quarter as speculation hit extreme highs."

The device turned out to be the iPhone 4S, which sold 4 million units in its first three days on the market, compared with 1.7 million iPhone 4 units sold during its launch weekend.

"In our wildest dreams we couldn't have gotten off to a start as great as we have for the iPhone 4S."