en.Wedoany.com Reported - Driven by strong performance in its memory business, Samsung Electronics' second-quarter earnings outlook has drawn significant market attention. According to a consensus of 30 institutional forecasts compiled by the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), Samsung's Q2 operating profit is expected to reach 86 trillion won (approximately $563.5 billion), far exceeding the 4.7 trillion won recorded in the same period last year. More optimistic institutions, such as KB Securities, estimate the figure could reach 90 trillion won, with an operating profit margin of 51%. If this forecast materializes, Samsung would surpass Nvidia's first-quarter operating profit of $535.3 billion, setting a new single-quarter profit record for global tech companies and achieving a third consecutive quarter of record-high profits, reflecting the ongoing tight global memory supply.
The core driver behind this surge in earnings is the memory price rally fueled by AI demand. Citi Research noted that average selling prices for DRAM and NAND rose 44% and 53% quarter-over-quarter, respectively, in the second quarter. Unlike earlier AI focused on large model training, AI agents can execute more complex, multi-step tasks, requiring servers to be equipped with more memory for data retention and retrieval. Analysts expect this supply-demand imbalance to persist at least until 2027. Samsung has taken a firm stance in Q3 negotiations, planning to raise general DRAM prices by another 20%. Ahead of the earnings release, Kim Yong-kwan, head of Samsung Electronics' Device Solutions (DS) division, stated at an internal meeting that this year's profit alone would exceed the cumulative profit from its 40 years in the semiconductor business. The market generally forecasts Samsung's full-year 2026 operating profit could reach 300 trillion won (approximately $2 trillion). To address the AI wave, Samsung and SK Hynix have jointly pledged to invest 3,200 trillion won (approximately $2.07 trillion) to expand domestic production capacity in South Korea, with Samsung's investments continuing until 2040. Samsung is actively expanding its collaboration with Google and increasing supply of HBM4/HBM4E to Nvidia, aiming to reclaim the top spot in the HBM market by 2027.
Despite strong fundamentals, several potential risks remain. Samsung has reached an agreement with its labor union to allocate 10.5% of its semiconductor division's profit as bonuses. This provision is estimated to exceed 40 trillion won, and if recognized in Q2, it could depress the final reported profit figure. On the downstream cost pressure front, Apple has raised prices for Mac and iPad models due to rising memory costs. It is rumored that Apple CEO Tim Cook even personally lobbied the U.S. government, seeking cheaper memory sources. The market fears that if prices rise to levels consumers find unacceptable, tech giants' procurement intentions may shrink. Institutions like JPMorgan question whether the trend of cloud service providers allocating over 70% of their spending to AI memory can be sustained long-term.
