Apple reported on Thursday that its quarterly revenue fell for the first time after more than three years of growth. The iPhone manufacturer's sales fell in all regions, with the largest drop in China this quarter.

In the three months ended December 31, Apple's revenue fell 5.5% year-on-year to $117.2 billion, lower than Wall Street's expectations. Sales of iPhone fell 8.2% year-on-year to $65.8 billion.

Greater China, including Chinese Mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, China, saw the largest drop in revenue in this quarter, down 7.3% year-on-year to US $23.9 billion.

Japan's revenue fell by 5% to US $6.8 billion, while that of other regions in the Asia-Pacific region fell by 2.8% to US $9.5 billion.

Despite the overall decline, Apple said that it had set historical revenue records in some markets, including Indonesia and Vietnam, and set quarterly records in India.

Cook said, "I am very optimistic about the future of India."

Due to the holiday season and the release of the new iPhone, the December quarter is usually the peak season for Apple. Last September, the company launched the iPhone 14 series.

However, Apple was affected by the weakness of the global smartphone market. The company issued a warning to investors on November 6, saying that the shipment volume of the two new models, iPhone14 Pro and iPhone14 ProMax, would be lower than expected, and customers would have to wait longer to receive the new products.

Cook said: "The capacity is now back to the state we want."

At the same time, International Data Corporation, a market intelligence company, said that due to the sharp decline in consumer demand, inflation and economic uncertainty, the total global smartphone shipments in 2022 were 1.21 billion, the lowest annual shipments since 2013.

According to the Nikkei Asia report, as a sign of the bleak prospect of consumer electronics products, Apple has informed many suppliers that the number of parts produced for AirPods, AppleWatch and MacBooks in the first quarter decreased due to weak demand.

Apple said that due to the persistence of many adverse factors encountered by the company in the last quarter, it is expected that the revenue of this quarter will continue to decline year-on-year.