TSMC reports plunging revenues

"We will certainly have a challenging time in the first quarter but it is likely to prove a bottoming-out [period] for us."

Rick Tsai, TSMC chief executive officer

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufac-turing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world's biggest contract chipmaker by revenue, said yesterday its revenue fell by 20 percent last month when compared to the same month last year.

Revenue NT$20.85 billion (US$630.38 million), 20.4 percent less than the NT$26.18 billion posted for January last year.

TSMC not comment on the revenue numbers at a teleconference, but earlier company executives said that weak revenue was possible during the first quarter, a typically slow season, because clients are working through excess inventories.

Last month, TSMC reported that its fourth-quarter net profit fell 17.7 percent from a year ago to NT$27.91 billion. Quarterly revenue totaled NT$74.96 billion, down 5.4 percent from a year ago.

In its guidance given last month, TSMC said it expected sales in the first quarter to March to drop to within the NT$62 billion to NT$64 billion range.

"We will certainly have a challenging time in the first quarter but it is likely to prove a bottoming-out [period] for us," TSMC chief executive officer Rick Tsai (蔡力行) said at the time.

"A recovery can be expected from as early as the end of March," he added.

On Thursday, rival United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) said its sales last month fell to NT$8.24 billion from NT$8.37 billion in December, and were down 2.03 percent year-on-year.

The company, the world's second-largest wafer foundry, did not provide a specific sales projection for the first quarter to March.

But on Wednesday, UMC told an investor conference that wafer shipments in this quarter are expected to decline by between 5 and 6 percent from the fourth quarter of last year, while its prices are also expected to drop by 5 to 6 percent during the same period.

Shares TSMC were down NT$0.40 at NT$68.00 while UMC rose NT$0.40 to NT$20.60 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.