Apple announces massive loss; more losses for next two quarters

As expected, Apple announced a massive shortfall this week, losing more than $120 million, which exceeded Wall Street expectations. Sales of Apple Macintosh products fell 32%, with the Performa line selling especiallypoorly. Apple's Chief Financial Officer, who would probably give up a lungto switch jobs with Microsoft's Mike Brown (see story "Microsoft announces record earnings", above) claims that Apple is still financially sound, with "$1.8 billion in cash and improved inventory management during thequarter."Apple is expecting to lose money for the next two quarters as well asit attempts to stem it's incredible marketshare decline and improverelations with its customers and development community. This means thatApple will lose money for six months longer than originally promisedby Gil Armelio when he took the helm last year. Apple's debt rating wasalso cut.Apple CEO Gil Armelio released a letter to Apple users this week, apologizing for the disappointing quarter. He mentioned, however, that theproblem was largely in the U.S. only and that foreign markets werehealthy. I don't want to drag this into a long debate, but this soundssuspiciously like something Commodore would have announced during the Amiga days. Armelio believes that the acquisition of NeXT will turn the company around