Samsung Electronics (KRX: 005930) expects third-quarter operating profit to have jumped 782.5% year on year to KRW107.4 trillion ($80.1bn), as artificial intelligence drives a worldwide memory chip shortage and pushes up prices, AFPÂ reports.
The South Korean group is the world’s biggest memory chipmaker, and data centres running AI are buying up its advanced products. The preliminary figure would make Samsung the first South Korean company to earn more than KRW100 trillion in operating profit in a single quarter. It would also extend the company’s run of record sales and profit to four straight quarters.
Revenue for July to September probably climbed 127% to KRW195 trillion, the company said in a statement. Final results are due at the end of October.
South Korean brokerage Shinhan Securities wrote in a note last week that it expected “even stronger earnings” from Samsung next year.
“Samsung Electronics now appears all set for a rapid increase in market share,” the Shinhan analysts said accordng to AFP. They pointed to the company’s rising output of HBM4, its newest generation of high-bandwidth memory chips.
Samsung, domestic rival SK hynix and US-based Micron control the global market for HBM, which is used in AI data centres. “The transition to next-generation HBM will open up the opportunity to renegotiate prices” for Samsung, “helping to guarantee solid margins,” the note said.
In August, Samsung unveiled a buyback of as much as $80bn of its shares. The company said the plan would ensure that the “fruits of the company’s growth translate into tangible benefits” for shareholders.
Earlier this year, Samsung headed off a strike at home by agreeing to pay semiconductor staff bonuses equal to 10.5% of operating profit. About 78,000 of its 125,000 domestic employees qualify for a payout of roughly $370,000 each this year, based on market profit estimates.
In Taiwan, union representatives said hundreds of workers at a Micron plant had backed strike action after bonus negotiations with the US company broke down.