An LSEG SmartEstimate puts Samsung's July-September operating profit at 106.1 trillion won, nearly nine times a year earlier, with preliminary results due Thursday.
Samsung Electronics is expected to report a nearly nine-fold jump in third-quarter operating profit, driven by AI demand, Reuters reported from Seoul. An LSEG SmartEstimate, based on 21 analysts and weighted toward those with stronger records, puts July-September operating profit at 106.1 trillion won, about $79.1 billion.
That would be up from 12.17 trillion won a year earlier and a fourth straight quarter of record operating profit. The estimate has been cut 7.7 percent since the end of August. Samsung is due to publish preliminary results on Thursday, with detailed figures later in October.
Analysts have trimmed forecasts as memory-price gains moderated and the won strengthened. TrendForce expects conventional DRAM contract prices to rise 10 to 15 percent in the fourth quarter, slower than a second-quarter surge of roughly 60 percent. SK Securities analyst Han Dong-hee estimates Samsung's memory operating margin at 76 percent in the third quarter, flat with the previous quarter.
J.P. Morgan estimates Samsung's high-bandwidth memory share will rise to 34 percent this year from 20 percent last year, while SK Hynix's share falls to 46 percent from 60 percent. The won gained 14.3 percent against the dollar in the quarter, which reduces the won value of overseas earnings.
These are forecasts, not Samsung's results. The company had not released the preliminary figure when Reuters published the estimate.
People Sentiments Mixed
- Avril Wu of TrendForce said the memory market remains tight but the pace of price growth is expected to slow.