Samsung Electronics said on the 7th that on a consolidation basis, its preliminary results for the second quarter of this year came to 171 trillion won in revenue and 89.4 trillion won in operating profit.
Revenue surged 129.3% from 74.57 trillion won a year earlier, and operating profit jumped 1,810.3% from 4.68 trillion won to 89.4 trillion won. The company broke its all-time quarterly records from the first quarter (revenue 133.87 trillion won and operating profit 57.23 trillion won) after just one quarter.
The preliminary results released that day were estimated under the Korea-adopted International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Samsung Electronics has not yet completed its settlement of account, but released the forecast first to provide information that meets investor convenience and global standards.
Although results by business unit were not disclosed, the industry believes the semiconductor business led the record performance. It is analyzed that profitability in the memory business improved significantly on expanded supply of sixth-generation high-bandwidth memory (HBM4), which began mass production in February as a world first, to big tech and a sharp rise in prices of standard DRAM.
Brokerages estimate the Device Solutions (DS) division, which handles semiconductors, likely accounted for most of the operating profit. The foundry (contract chip manufacturing) business, which had been in the red, is also assessed to have contributed to the improvement by narrowing losses on better utilization of advanced process lines and stronger demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips.
The industry also believes the semiconductor business's underlying profitability was even higher, considering the DS division booked this quarter the provision for special performance bonuses to be paid early next year.
With the latest results, Samsung Electronics is estimated to have become the world's No. 1 company by quarterly operating profit. Operating profit in dollar terms is about $58.4 billion, exceeding Nvidia's $53.5 billion in the previous quarter. However, simple comparisons have limits because the settlement of account periods differ by company.
The industry expects Samsung Electronics' results to continue growing in the second half as investment in AI infrastructure expands and memory prices remain strong.