Posted on 04/27/2023 4:01:14 AM PDT by FarCenter
SEOUL -- Samsung Electronics said on Thursday that its mainstay semiconductor business swung to an operating loss of 4.6 trillion won ($3.4 billion) in the first quarter from a profit of 8.5 trillion won a year earlier, as the world's biggest memory chipmaker navigates a brutal downturn in the global market for the key component.
The South Korean tech behemoth also confirmed that operating profit for the company as a whole slumped to 640 billion won for the first three months of the year, down 95.5% from a year earlier. Revenue dropped 18.1% to 63.8 trillion won. The figures were slightly better than earnings guidance issued earlier this month.
Samsung did not announce the scope of the losses in the semiconductor-dominated device solutions division when it announced overall operating profit and revenue estimates on April 7. But it said it was forced to slash memory chip output to a "meaningful level" due to declining demand resulting from weak global economic growth and consumer sentiment. The move followed similar ones by rivals SK Hynix of South Korea and Micron of the U.S.
Underscoring the difficulties, revenue in the semiconductor business dropped 49% to 13.7 trillion won from the year-earlier period.
In a news release, Samsung cited "weak demand in the memory business, a decline in utilization rates in the foundry business, and continued weak demand and inventory adjustments from customers" as being behind the poor performance in semiconductors. "In the second quarter, while current market conditions are expected to remain, the DS division will focus on boosting technological competitiveness, ... while meeting demand for ... high-end products."
(Excerpt) Read more at asia.nikkei.com ...
Weak demand over a decent product offering (even less than the COVID numbers of last year). This means the global recession is starting to take effect even more.
It’s not a coinkydink that Deep States all over the globe are busily, efficiently exterminating their middle classes.
I was wondering if the moves to ramp up US semiconductor production had any effect.
Really good time to buy Samsung, too bad they’re not on the US Stock Market.
Samsung is building a massive plant in Taylor TX right now
People used to think Sony could recover from anything. Then they started making movies...hired bad writers, actors, cyber security and got brutally hacked by North Korea.
That’s how I see it. I don’t think we ever exited 2008 if you take the deficit spending out. I think the economy is going to go down a bit and stay there for a while.
Sony was bad decisions, Samsung is market and political.
Most of it is because of the supply chain bubble. During the slow down companies ordered 2 or 3 times what they would normally use for fear of not getting needed parts. When the supply chain caught up and all that stock was delivered, companies didn’t need to order the normal amount for the next period or two. Some undelivered orders were even canceled. That is why they went from +8B to -3B .
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