By Zeba Fatima

Apple reported its best quarter ever for revenue, earnings and iPhone sales as consumers continue to show strong demand for its latest iPads and iPhones.

The Company posted record quarterly revenue of $46.33 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.06 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share for its fiscal 2012 first quarter which spanned 14 weeks ending December 31, 2012.

These results compare to revenue of $26.74 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 44.7% compared to 38.5% in the year-ago quarter.

Following on from the release of the iPhone 4s last year, Apple sold 37.04 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 128% unit growth over the year-ago quarter.

15.43 million iPads were sold during the quarter, a 111% unit increase over the year-ago quarter, and 5.2 million Macs were sold during the quarter, a unit increase of 26%.

iPods were the only category to decline, Apple sold 15.4 million units, a 21% decline from the year-ago quarter.

The latest quarter results represent the first full earnings period with Tim Cook as chief executive. Co-founder Steve Jobs stepped down as CEO in August and died months later.

“Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline,” Cook said in a statement.

“We are very happy to have generated over $17.5 billion in cash flow from operations during the December quarter,” said Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer.

“Looking ahead to the second fiscal quarter of 2012, which will span 13 weeks, we expect revenue of about $32.5 billion and we expect diluted earnings per share of about $8.50.”

On October 18, 2011, Oppenheimer gave Q112 guidance of “revenue of about $37 billion” and “diluted earnings per share of about $9.30.”