Samsung Electronics stock was on the rise for the majority of the day amid strong optimism regarding the company’s general performance in the third quarter of the year, with its shares jumping by 4.5 percentage points when the trading started on Tuesday and still ending 2.96 percent higher when the market closed earlier today, currently amounting to 2,640,000 won or just under $2,330. The South Korean original equipment manufacturer is set to publicize its consolidated financial report for the third quarter of the year in late October, with most industry watchers expecting it to disclose yet another extremely profitable period, largely thanks to the strong performance of its chipmaking division which has already recorded several impressive quarters in a row and even surpassed Intel as the world’s largest manufacturer of chips.
Samsung’s latest jump in stock value was the largest one the firm experienced in a year and while some investors previously raised concerns about the sustainability of the company’s current performance, the global demand for memory chips is still at its peak, allowing Samsung to reap the profits of its previous investments in this segment. According to the Seoul-based tech giant’s last financial report, its chip unit recorded $15.65 billion in sales during the second quarter of the year, with nearly half of that sum — $7.15 billion — amounting to income. While Intel isn’t far behind Samsung’s chipmaking operations in terms of pure revenue, its profits were almost half the size of Samsung’s over the three-month period ending June 30, with that state of affairs being one of the main reasons for optimism among the Korean conglomerate’s investors.
Samsung’s previous dominance in the NAND flash and DRAM markets should continue in the second half of the year, some industry trackers previously said, though it remains to be seen whether the tech giant manages to outperform its already record-breaking quarters before entering 2018. The company’s long-term plans are still somewhat unclear at the moment, with its de facto chief Jay Y. Lee presently appealing a five-year prison sentence for bribery and embezzlement of corporate funds, his father and Samsung Group Chairman Lee Jae-yong being in a reportedly comatose state for the last three years, and the chaebol as a whole running its business without a clear leader for the time being.