Apple Highlights: 'Significant' China Growth, Apple Watch Sales Estimates & So Much More

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Wall Street is
bullish
about the results for
Apple Inc.'sAAPL
fiscal 2015 second quarter. Some analysts expect the company to
beat the Street consensus
for iPhone sales, leading to another record-breaking quarter. Answers will come Monday after the close when Apple releases its Q2 results. Until then, Benzinga has compiled a list of the most important Apple headlines leading up to earnings.

China Could Be Key To Q2 Growth

If the March quarter proves to be another record-breaking event, it might be due to one key market: China. In a
note to investors
, Stifel's Aaron C. Rakers referred to China as the "most significant swing factor" for Apple's Q2 results.

Related Link: Apple Pay Scandal Overshadowed By Dow Jones Entry

22% Of Benzinga Readers Say They Want An Apple Watch

Of the 2,210 readers that
responded
to a Benzinga poll, nearly 22 percent (429 individuals) said they would buy an Apple Watch.

Nearly 1M Apple Watches Might Have Been Sold Ahead Of Release

Before the watch arrived in stores,
Slice Intelligence
released a report indicating that 957,000 US consumers might have pre-ordered the device.
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Online-Only Apple Watch Sales Confused Some Customers

Before its release,
millions of consumers
were thought to have pre-ordered the Apple Watch online. Others planned to buy it in store but were unaware that Apple did not
ship any units
to its own domestic retailers. Analysts were
not very concerned
about the confusion and instead focused on the high demand for Apple's first smartwatch.

Several Fintech Companies Pledged Their Support For Apple Watch

The fintech community is
very excited
about the Apple Watch. Several fintech startups have
pledged their support
for the wearable device. "Anyone that's an investor [will] want to be able to check stock quotes and interface with their portfolio and see if the portfolio is up or down and what it's doing for the day," Cody Willard, chairman of
Scutify
(a financial social network), told Benzinga. "We've got to move forward if we're moving to a wearables culture."

Will A $20K Smartphone Follow Apple's $17K Smartwatch?

Apple is charging $17,000 for its most expensive smartwatch -- could it do the same for a future iPhone? "You don't start needing that many $10,000 to $20,000 watches or $20,000 to $30,000 bedazzled iPhones…to actually move the needle," Sean Udall, CIO of Quantum Trading Strategies and author of The TechStrat Report,
told Benzinga
. "We'll see. That's kind of a fun thing to speculate about. I'm not sure it's gonna be a multi-billion-dollar revenue stream."

In-Store Buying Experience Went Online

Consumers jumped at the chance to pre-order the Apple Watch, but some missed the experience of waiting in line with friends and other Apple enthusiasts. Some of them decided to take matters into their own hands and organize their own pre-order parties. "It is always the diehard fans that stand in the line," Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry
told Benzinga
. "Since now the line has changed from the physical world to [the] digital world, how do you create the same ambiance? You have these parties."

Apple Watch Reviews Were Full Of Praise, Confusion And Few Recommendations

Most critics had at least one
good thing to say
about the Apple Watch. They also typically ended their review with the same message: it is not yet a must-have product.

iPhone Might Have Acquired $2 Billion Worth Of Samsung Customers

The Apple Watch hype might have caused some investors to miss this key tidbit from Leon Majors, senior vice president of Phoenix Marketing International. "Samsung was selling a lot of large-screen phones into the Apple user base," Majors
told Benzinga
. "Apple has reversed that and sold, in my estimation, $2 billion worth of large screen phones into Samsung's user base."

Steve Jobs Wasn't Opposed To A Partnership With Nintendo

Asif Khan, CFO of Virtue LLC and CEO of
Shacknews.com
, recently
told Benzinga
about the time he approached Steve Jobs with an idea. "In 2010, I told Steve Jobs that he should form a strategic partnership with Nintendo because Apple doesn't make games," said Khan. "Ideally, Apple should have their own gaming studio. In lieu of that, they should pay game developers for exclusive content." Jobs gave his usual response that Apple "can only do a few things really well." "But he did say a strategic partnership -- if profitable -- makes a lot of sense," said Khan. Disclosure:
At the time of this writing, Louis Bedigian had no position in the equities mentioned in this report.
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