Bittersweet; that's the only way we can describe it. If you didn't catch Apple CFO Fred Anderson's farewell quarterly earnings conference call, you should really make sure you catch the rebroadcast, because we're all really going to miss that guy. When he started going on about his imminent June 1st departure and how his eight years of service were a "real privilege," we got a little choked up; we could barely hold our lighters steady as we swayed in unison. Our only regret is that he didn't play "Freebird." Any chance of a comeback tour in ten years?

Still, soon-to-be-CFO Peter Oppenheimer handled himself well, we thought; of course, it didn't hurt that his material was so solid. As reported in Apple's official press release, Q2 was a happy one for Apple, with a profit of $46 million for the quarter ($53 million, if you ignore a one-time restructuring charge) which topped analysts' expectations by $16 million or so. The good news just came right on coming, too: it was Apple's best March quarter in four years, revenue was up 29% from the year-ago quarter, iPod sales somehow increased from last year's holiday blowout, iBook sales were off the hook, etc. Moreover, the bad news was all relatively minor league stuff: yes, there are sound problems with some miniPods (an "extremely small" number); sure, Xserve G5s were late because IBM couldn't cough up enough chips; okay, sales aren't great in Japan. But none of that seems to be dampening the mood about Apple's success.

Want proof? Then consider this weirdness: while Apple once again beat the analyst consensus and dished out a heaping helping of good news, its stock actually took a hop up instead of its typical post-earnings downward dip. The stock rose $2.65 (that's almost a 10% spike) in after-hours trading, which is practically unheard of following an Apple conference call. If we had to guess, we'd figure that investors are going ga-ga over the iPod sales figures: 807,000 sold for the quarter, beating the holiday frenzy of 733,000 and up a staggering 909% from sales in the year-ago quarter. Personally, we're a little wigged out by Apple selling more iPods than Macs, but hey, even Mac sales were up a little from a year ago, so we'll live. And Apple claims that next quarter ought to be the company's fourth consecutive one showing double-digit year-over-year revenue growth... and there isn't a single word in that sentence that investors wouldn't like. (Well, except maybe "digit." Sounds a little tinny.)

But, of course, most AtAT viewers already know all this stuff, and are only still waiting for the day's big news: the winner of our quarterly Beat The Analysts contest. So without further ado, join us in congratulating (or cursing the luck of, depending on your temperament) Jason Bowman, the only entrant to guess Apple's actual reported recurring profit of $53 million on the nose. For his remarkable financial perspicacity-- which is high-falutin' talk for "really lucky guess"-- Jason will soon receive the AtAT garment of his choice, or, if he's got some sort of freakish geek museum he's working on cobbling together, an ancient-but-shrinkwrapped software title from our Baffling Vault of Antiquity™. So mucho congrats to Jason-- and to the other 500-odd entrant who walk away with squat, it's never too early to start crunching numbers for next quarter...