![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/news-p.v1.20260830.be82e64f1ec44492914d556272a6f4a5_P1.jpg\")
The headquarters of Samsung Electronics in Suwon (left) and SK hynix in Icheon, both in Gyeonggi Province (Newsis) <\/p>\n The headquarters of Samsung Electronics in Suwon (left) and SK hynix in Icheon, both in Gyeonggi Province (Newsis) <\/p>\n
Samsung Electronics and SK hynix paid a combined 11.21 trillion won ($7.99 billion) in corporate taxes in the first half, up 167 percent from a year earlier, as the AI-driven chip boom translated into higher tax bills.<\/p>\n
According to regulatory filings Sunday, Samsung paid 3.99 trillion won, up from 1.12 trillion won a year earlier. SK hynix paid a record 7.22 trillion won, more than double the previous year\u2019s 3.07 trillion won.<\/p>\n
The combined total was the second-highest for any first half, trailing only the 12.66 trillion won paid in 2019. SK hynix surpassed its previous half-year record of 4.53 trillion won, also set in 2019.<\/p>\n
The 2019 peak reflected the previous year\u2019s semiconductor boom, when Samsung posted a record operating profit of 58.9 trillion won, and SK hynix logged 20.8 trillion won.<\/p>\n
Corporate tax payments generally lag earnings. Companies with fiscal years ending in December settle taxes on the previous year\u2019s income in March and make interim payments in August. For around 2,600 large-group affiliates, excluding small and medium-sized enterprises, the August payment is based on provisional first-half results.<\/p>\n
Samsung\u2019s first-half operating profit surged to 146.7 trillion won from 11.4 trillion won a year earlier, while SK hynix\u2019s jumped to 98.2 trillion won from 16.7 trillion won.<\/p>\n
Market consensus puts their full-year operating profits at 385 trillion won and 266 trillion won, respectively, compared with 43.5 trillion won and 47.2 trillion won in 2025.<\/p>\n
The earnings surge is expected to lift both interim payments in August and final tax settlements in March. Their combined annual corporate tax bill last peaked at 15.64 trillion won in 2019, a record likely to be surpassed after more than 11.2 trillion won was paid in the first half alone.<\/p>\n
A simple calculation based on combined separate-basis operating profit of 500 trillion won to 600 trillion won and a 20 percent effective tax rate suggests their bill could exceed 100 trillion won. Actual payments could be lower depending on taxable income and tax credits for R&D and domestic investment.<\/p>\n
yeeun@heraldcorp.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The headquarters of Samsung Electronics in Suwon (left) and SK hynix in Icheon, both in Gyeonggi Province (Newsis)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[241,240],"class_list":["post-136575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sk","tag-sk","tag-sk-group"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}