By Marc Arcas

San Francisco, Jan 28 (EFE).- Apple on Tuesday reversed a trend that had plagued the firm all of last year, surprising investors and analysts with a substantial hike in iPhone sales over the past three months, performance that gave the tech giant the best quarterly income performance in its history.

The firm headed by Tim Cook made $22.236 billion in the first three months of its fiscal year, 11.37 percent more than during the same period last year, and iPhone sales were up by 7.6 percent to $55.957 billion, exceeding the $51.982 billion such sales brought in during the same period in 2019.

Since last year, Apple has not reported in its publicly released figures the exact number of telephones or the models it has sold, but the fact that the rebound coincides with the Christmas season and came shortly after the release of the iPhone 11 strongly suggests that the new models were responsible for the earnings resurgence.

CEO Cook confirmed the results, citing "direct demand" for the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro, both of which were launched last September.

Over the past three months, the Cupertino, California-based tech giant raked in sales of $91.819 billion, above the $84.310 billion it brought in during the same period in 2019, and its shares gained $8.74 each (2.83 percent) on Wall Street during trading on Tuesday, closing at $317.69, with further up movement coming in after-hours trading.

Earnings came in at $4.99 per share for the quarter.

Although the iPhone was the product that stood out most in the financial results released on Tuesday due to its unexpected sales strength, the firm also experienced noteworthy growth in two other categories considered to be key for its future.

One of those categories was services, where over the past quarter Apple TV+ hit the market. The firm's direct content subscription streaming service brought in a total of $12.715 billion, an increase of 16.9 percent over the same period last year.

The other category was that of wearable tech for the home and accessories, including the popular smartwatch, Apple Watch, and AirPods earbuds, which together posted sales growth of 36.97 percent to $10.01 billion.

Mac computers and iPad tablets were both down in sales, but that revenue loss was more than outweighed by the increases in other areas.

By regions, Apple's revenue increased all over the world, except for in Japan, with especially strong growth coming in the Americas and in Europe, and at a slower - but still very significant - pace in China, a market considered to be key for the company's growth and where it lost ground last year.

Specifically, the trade war repercussions in China and iPhone sales were the two clouds hovering over Apple all of last year and these two factors had fostered doubts about the firm's future, although both difficulties eased significantly for the company this past quarter.

Despite the good movement in the Chinese market, the firm lately has been somewhat discombobulated by the outbreak of the coronavirus, which has its epicenter in Wuhan, and Cook said that Apple had been forced to close one of its stores in the Asian giant and restrict travel by its employees.

© 2020 EFE News Services (U.S.) Inc., source EFE Ingles