Jobs illness set to overshadow expected 50% surge in Apple sales

The health of Apple chief executive Steve Jobs was expected to overshadow the company's quarterly results announcement last night, despite Wall Street expectations of big profits.

Analysts were predicting the consumer electronics powerhouse behind the big-selling iPhone and iPad to report sales growth of about 50 per cent for its first fiscal quarter, with sales of about $24.4 billion.

But Apple shares, up 62 per cent in the last 12 months, were down 3.4 per cent in midday trade in the US, although they did rise in European trading.

Apple, the world's largest technology company by market capitalisation, said on Monday that Jobs, 55, was taking medical leave of absence, without specifying a return date or detailing his condition.

Shawn Kravetz, president of Boston-based hedge fund firm Esplanade Capital, said Jobs' latest medical leave was clearly a negative, but "that doesn't take away from an extraordinary company with a great team".

Aside from Jobs' health, the company is entering 2011 on a roll, a cash-generating machine with surging sales across its product lines.

Wall Street's benchmarks for Apple's fiscal first quarter, which includes the holiday shopping season, are sales of roughly 15.5 million iPhones, 5.5 million iPads and four million Mac computers.

Apple's advantages include the global spread of the iPhone, expected to sell more than 60 million units this year; the rise of the iPad which single-handedly created the tablet computing market; and continued strong growth from the resurgent Mac line of computers.

Apple was expected to report earnings of $5.40 a share. Even so, an out-sized surprise in Apple results has become an article of faith among investors.

The company has beaten Wall Street's earnings estimate by an average 29 per cent over the past two years.

In Jobs' absence, it will be up to chief operating officer Tim Cook to decide what Apple plans to do with its $50 billion-plus pile of cash and investments.