Published : Sept. 10, 2017 - 16:01
Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest producer of memory chips and smartphones, may beat market expectations and post earnings growth in the third quarter despite earlier predictions of adjustments, market watchers said Sunday.
Forecasts for a leveling off are centered on expectations that prices of both liquid-crystal displays and organic light-emitting diodes will fall due to current market conditions.
Observers had said Samsung could experience almost no growth because its second quarter operating profits hit an unprecedented 14.07 trillion won ($12.38 billion) with sales hitting 61 trillion won.
The conservative assessment also came as Samsung took the unusual step during its second-quarter conference call that earnings could fall off in the following three months. FnGuide Inc., a local market researcher, actually slightly lowered operating profit numbers last week.
(Yonhap)
Such estimates, however, have started to change as many industry trackers Friday began predicting earnings may top initial numbers. In particular, sources cited signs that sales of OLED panels and chips made by Samsung may do well because of demand for new mobile devices and the launch of the new iPhone to be unveiled this week.
Kim Sun-woo, an analyst at Meritz Securities, said Samsung sales could conceivably hit 64.84 trillion won in the June-September period, with operating profits rising to 14.35 trillion won.
"Samsung's cautious guidance report reflects underlying uncertainties in the market, yet strong demand in computer chips and stable profits being generated in the smartphone market are bolstering expectations," Kim said.
This view was echoed by eBEST Investment Securities Co. market watcher Eo Kyu-jin, who estimated operation profits may stand at just under 14.3 trillion won, with sales hovering over 62.4 trillion won.
He said better-than-expected prices for dynamic random access memory and NAND flash memory can allow the South Korean tech giant to post record operating profits of 9.7 trillion won in the semiconductor sector alone.
Other industry watchers at Heungkuk Securities said a profit of 14.5 trillion won may be possible for the current quarter.
For the last three months of 2017, eBEST Investment and Dongbu Securities Co. predicted operating profits will go back up to a record-breaking 16.5 trillion won and 15.5 trillion won, respectively. (Yonhap)