DRAM chipmaker Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday said its revenue tumbled 30 percent last quarter as end-product demand shrank across the board amid a US-China trade deadlock and shortage of Intel Corp PC microprocessors.
Slower chip demand brought down the average selling price of DRAM chips by about 5 percent last month from November, while shipments fell 5 percent, it said.
As a result, revenue declined 10.62 percent to a 15-month low of NT$4.83 billion (US$156.38 million) last month, compared with NT$5.4 billion in November.
Quarterly revenue plummeted 30.43 percent to NT$16.96 billion from NT$24.38 billion in the third quarter, putting an end to nine consecutive quarters of increases.
Nanya Technology had forecast that revenue would slide moderately in the final quarter of last year, as it expected DRAM chip prices to drop only 5 percent from three months earlier.
However, “demand was weaker than we thought during the investors’ conference [in October],” company deputy spokesperson Joseph Wu (吳志祥) said. “The macroeconomy proved worse as US-China trade tensions remained acute.”
Faced with an uncertain future, manufacturers in the server, PC and notebook computer segments are balking at expanding capacity and hesitant to build DRAM inventory as the trade dispute stokes fears about end demand, Wu said.
Sagging demand for Apple Inc’s iPhones and Android-based phones provided the latest evidence, he said.
In October, Nanya Technology president Lee Pei-ing (李培瑛) said that demand would slow only a bit as some PC assemblers consider relocating their Chinese production lines to other countries to circumvent US tariffs on Chinese goods.
“Companies from the three segments — PC, notebook and smartphone — have all turned conservative about end demand [prospects],” Wu said.
Market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) predicted that DRAM chip prices would tumble by about 15 percent this quarter from last quarter.
Nanya Technology is scheduled to provide detailed earnings figures and business outlook at a quarterly investors’ conference on Jan. 15.
Shares of Nanya Technology plunged 6.36 percent to NT$51.50 in Taipei trading yesterday.
The chipmaker has sought to shore up its share price through a stock purchase program.
It has bought 5.59 million shares, or 1.16 percent of its total outstanding shares, for NT$298.17 million on the open market, it said.
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