Samsung Earnings One Day Out: Meritz's 90 Trillion Won Call Lifts the Bar
Attention is fixed on Samsung Electronics' preliminary second-quarter results, due around 7:30 a.m. Tuesday. The current brokerage consensus sits around 85 trillion won in operating profit, with individual estimates ranging widely from the low 80-trillion-won range up to 90 trillion won — a spread analysts attribute to differing assumptions about how much of the special bonus provision gets booked this quarter.
A report released the day before the announcement, from Meritz Securities analyst Kim Sun-woo, drew particular attention. Kim topped this year's rankings as the best semiconductor analyst and correctly called Samsung's first-quarter results, lending the report credibility. His estimate puts pre-provision profit in the Device Solutions (semiconductor) division alone at about 109.5 trillion won, with company-wide pre-provision operating profit near 110 trillion won — roughly double the 57 trillion won posted in the first quarter. Even after deducting about 19 trillion won in total provisions — roughly 13 trillion won for this quarter's special bonus plus a retroactive 5 trillion won from the first quarter — he still expects final operating profit of about 90 trillion won.
The hosts noted that credibility runs high given the report came out the day before the announcement from a top-ranked analyst with an accurate track record. Market expectations had already been running high, and a few brokerages had recently trimmed their estimates citing provision concerns — but this figure was described as a surprise large enough to make the whole 'were expectations high or low' debate moot. Samsung shares gained about 0.3% intraday to reclaim the 310,000-won level, partly reflecting this earnings optimism.
SK Hynix's ADR listing on the Nasdaq, set for this Friday, is another key variable. The listing is expected to raise about 45 trillion won for domestic chip investment; under relevant rules, the offering price will be set using the volume-weighted average of Korean closing prices over the three to five trading days before subscription, currently discussed around 2,555,000 won. SK Hynix shares fell about 4% on the day, briefly dipping below 2.3 million won intraday. Since the offering takes institutional subscriptions only, with no retail tranche, concerns emerged that the intensity of foreign and institutional selling over the coming days could directly affect how the offering price is set.