Apple: 50% of Mobile Revenue, 80% of Profit, Says Morgan Keegan

Morgan Keegan’s Tavis McCourt this morning reports that after looking at data from all makers of phones who have reported for the quarter thus far, he concludes that Apple (AAPL) has increased the disparity by which it dominates handset revenue and profit, and the result seems to be something of a “recession” for the handset industry globally.

“Apple simply dominated Q4:11 handset/mobile computing trends, and now accounts for nearly 50% of the revenues of the entire industry and over 80% of the profits by our calculation,” writes McCourt.

McCourt notes that global mobile computing revenue rose 34% with Apple’s results included, but sagged 0.4% in Q4 when Apple is taken out of the picture.

McCourt offers the following slide as the best illustration of Apple’s dominance of the industry:

Apple has gone from nothing five years ago to taking half the mobile industry’s revenue.

McCourt warns some vendors maybe not be able to continue to go the distance against Apple, as their profits are further constrained, and he sees potential exits this year, what he calls a “make or break” 2012.

The broad handset industry appears to be heading into recession territory with overall handset shipment growth decelerating substantially to the lowest level since 2009. It appears likely Q1:12 could decline Y/Y in unit terms if normal seasonality occurs. Historically, this has only happened during meaningful global recessions [�] Outside of Samsung, it�s getting increasingly hard to understand where the rest of the competitors will get the R&D dollars to compete longer term given their shrinking profitability. Perhaps Microsoft and Google have the answer.

(Since McCourt mentions Taiwan’s HTC (2498TW), I would note that the company’s shares fell another 7% to $513 in New Taiwan dollars today on the Taipei exchange after the company yesterday reported a Q4 outlook that was weaker than expected.)

McCourt maintains an Outperform rating on Apple shares, Market Perform on Motorola Mobility (MMI), Market Perform on Nokia (NOK), an Outperform on Qualcomm (QCOM), and a Market Perform on Research in Motion (RIMM).