Rising chip prices fuel Samsung’s best quarterly profit in 3 years

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd posted a 28% increase in operating profit on Friday, to its highest level in three years, driven by rising memory chip prices and display sales for its new flagship smartphone launches.

Preliminary earnings were up 26% from Q2 but were just below forecast, while market reaction remained subdued as analysts expected flat or slightly lower earnings for this quarter due to an expected drop in memory chip prices.

The world’s largest manufacturer of memory chips and smartphones estimates its profits from July to September at 15.8 trillion won (13.3 billion US dollars), which is below a SmartEstimate refinitive of 16.1 trillion won. It is the highest quarterly profit since the third quarter of 2018.