SEOUL (KOREA) – Samsung Electronics Co Ltd’s September-quarter profit likely increased more than a third, triggered by sales of strong smartphone and a slew of order for memory chips from Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, analysts said.
Samsung is likely to announce preliminary July-September operating profit and revenue on Thursday.
Profit likely rose 35% to 10.5 trillion won (£7.04 billion) during the same period a year earlier, according to Refinitiv SmartEstimate.
According to analysts, as Samsung’s overall chip business was muted, orders from Chinese smartphone maker Huawei might have led to a rise in sales. Chances are that Huawei piled stocks before US sanctions from mid-September, as the time after that restricted it from buying chips made using US technology without a license.
US rival Micron Technology Inc posted their share of profit last month, which possibly was helped by Huawei’s attempts to secure inventory, analysts said.
Analyst Song Myung-sup at HI Investment & Securities, said, “Huawei’s emergency orders from late August drove up Samsung’s DRAM and NAND chip shipments, offsetting the effect of weak prices and limiting the drop in semiconductor profits for the quarter.”
Third-quarter smartphone shipments likely increased to 48% to 80 million from the second quarter, according to analysts and data from Counterpoint Research.
Samsung is likely to list out detailed earnings figures later this month.