Samsung is expected to post the equivalent of $13.81 billion in operating profit for the first quarter of 2018, market analytics firm WISEfn forecasts, as reported by BusinessKorea. The figure represents an annual improvement of almost 50-percent, with the company generating approximately $9.31 billion in profit over the same period last year. The Seoul-based original equipment manufacturer is also expected to record $57.8 billion worth of sales in the first three-month spell of 2018. Despite the fact that Samsung’s first fiscal quarters are traditionally its weakest financial terms on an annual basis, this year’s results are now believed to be close to its record-breaking Q4 2017 performance which saw the company pull around $14.25 billion in operating profit.
The newly reported estimates are based on recent predictions made by a number of securities companies from Samsung’s home country and abroad. The South Korean tech giant is likely to announce its consolidated financial report for Q1 2018 in late April and should confirm its exact publication date in the coming days. While the firm is expected to see its display and memory units decline in terms of sales, its profitability shouldn’t take a significant hit, partially due to the still-rising DRAM prices. The reportedly lackluster global sales of Apple’s iPhone X should also affect Samsung’s display manufacturing operations which supply the OLED panels used by the latest iOS flagship.
The Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9 Plus should both be significant contributors to Samsung’s Q1 2018 bottom line even though the new Android handset duo is understood to be experiencing weaker sales than the Galaxy S8 lineup did last year. That state of affairs may prompt Samsung to debut the Galaxy Note 9 prior the usual late August timeframe when the company traditionally launches new additions to its S Pen-equipped phablet series, according to recent reports. The firm’s electronics unit is also expected to introduce a new bet in the form of a Bixby-powered smart speaker in the second half of the year, though most analysts are still reluctant to attempt predicting the commercial performance of that device which should take on the likes of the Google Home and Amazon’s Echo IoT families.