Acer Inc (宏碁), the world’s fourth-largest PC vendor, yesterday reported a third-quarter net profit of NT$68 million (US$2.3 million), up 21 percent quarter-on-quarter, and earnings per share (EPS) of NT$0.03, up 50 percent from the previous quarter.
However, operating income was NT$345 million in the third quarter, down 20 percent quarter-on-quarter and 127 percent year-on-year, while consolidated revenue was NT$104.4 billion, down 5.6 percent compared with the second quarter, but up 11.4 percent from a year ago, the company said in a statement.
That meant the company posted a worse-than-expected operating margin of 0.33 percent in the third quarter, compared with the 0.4 percent in the second quarter, the company's data showed.
The Taipei-based Acer did not provide explanations about its third-quarter results, nor did it give its business guidance for this quarter. The company is expected to release details of its results and an earnings outlook on Thursday, when it is scheduled to hold an investors’ conference in Taipei.
On Aug. 17, Acer chairman and chief executive officer Wang Jeng-tang (王振堂) said the company would likely have a flat performance in the third quarter compared with the second quarter.
He projected sequential growth of 5 percent to 10 percent in the fourth-quarter due to Windows 8 product launches, but said the company did not expect “explosive growth” for handheld devices running the Microsoft Corp’s new operating system.
Last week, market researcher International Data Corp said in a report that all PC vendors “are anxious to see the new operating system deliver on its promise of fueling momentum in the PC market.”
For the first three quarters of the year, Acer saw its consolidated revenue decline 5.7 percent to NT$328 billion from a year ago, while its operating income reached NT$916 million, up 114 percent year-on-year.
Acer stock dropped 0.9 percent to close at NT$26.95 in Taipei trading yesterday before the figures were released.
The company’s stock is down 0.19 percent this quarter and 24.72 percent this year, according to Taiwan Stock Exchange data.
(Additional reporting by George Liao)
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
RSS