High Tech Computer Corp (HTC, 宏達電), the world’s biggest maker of phones running Microsoft Corp’s system, expects revenues this year to grow more than 20 percent year-on-year, helped by sales of its new “Touch” phone next month, a company executive said yesterday.
Sales in the current quarter could reach NT$34 billion (US$1.12 billion), with 70 percent coming from high-priced third-generation (3G) handsets, aided by a new product launch on May 6 in London, HTC financial executive Cheng Hui-ming (鄭慧明) told an investor’s conference.
That would represent a 27 percent increase from NT$26.86 billion during the same period last year, or a 7 percent quarter-on-quarter increase.
Cheng also said the company was on track to hit its full-year revenue growth target of between 20 percent and 25 percent.
“This is the most important product for HTC this year,” Cheng said. “With this phone, we’re confident of landing orders from most major operators.”
But Cheng also warned of possible delays in shipments, as HTC has yet to obtain certification for the new handset model.
“Postponing shipments of the new Diamond model may put the share price under pressure during Monday’s trading. Investors are highly sensitive to delays in product launches,” said Lu Chia-lin (呂家霖), an analyst at Macquarie.
Macquarie has an “outperform” rating on HTC, with a target price ofNT$1,020, which implies about 30 percent upside.
“HTC’s outlook for the second quarter, however, looks quite good,” Lu said, adding that its net income may be sustained at first quarter levels.
Earlier this month, HTC said that net profits expanded at a faster-than-expected 25 percent year-on-year to NT$6.94 billion after deducting spending for employee bonuses, as it sold more high-margin 3G phones.
Gross margins this quarter may drop by half or a full percentage point to 35 percent or 35.5 percent from last quarter’s 36.1 percent because of a one-time inventory write-off — not demand concerns, Cheng said.
“[Demand in] Europe looks similar to what we saw in November and December,” Cheng said.
HTC derives the bulk — or 40 percent — of its sales from Europe.
Average selling prices are expected to remain firm in the current quarter, Cheng said, despite claims by rivals, such as Nokia Oyj, saying European demand was shifting to lower-priced models in the face of the economic slowdown.
HTC also plans to raise its dividend payout ratio to about 70 percent based on last year’s earnings. The company paid out 60 percent last year.
The board yesterday approved a proposal to distribute NT$34 per share in cash dividends and 30 percent in stock dividends based on the company’s earnings last year of NT$28.93 billion, or NT$50.44 per share.
The proposal will be voted on at the company’s annual shareholder’s meeting on June 30.
This week’s undoing of the TerraUSD algorithmic stablecoin and its sister token, Luna, has ramifications for all of crypto. First, there is the immediate impact: The rapid collapse of a once-popular pair of cryptocurrencies sent a ripple effect across the industry, contributing to plummeting coin prices that wiped hundreds of billions of market value from the digital-asset market and stoked worries over the potential fragility of digital-asset ventures. Then there are the knock-on effects. In addition to delivering punishing losses to individual users and investment firms, the spectacular failure of a market darling like Terra threatens to have a cooling effect
China’s biggest chipmaker has cut its outlook for the second quarter, joining a growing list of manufacturers warning about the fallout from lockdowns aimed at containing the country’s worst COVID-19 outbreak in two years. Semiconductor Manufacturing International Co (SMIC, 中芯) estimates a month-long lockdown in Shanghai could spur component shortages and logistics tangles, and erase about 5 percent of its output in the second quarter. “We are trying our best to mitigate the impact on product delivery,” SMIC Chairman Gao Yonggang (高永崗) told analysts on a call yesterday morning. “We are still assessing the actual impact as many suppliers restart their
DISRUPTIONS: The war in Ukraine, China’s lockdown measures, rising interest rates and inflation have thrown a wrench into business plans made years in advance Samsung Electronics Co is talking with foundry clients about charging as much as 20 percent more for making semiconductors this year, joining an industry-wide push to hike prices to cover rising costs of materials and logistics. Contract-based chip prices are likely to rise around 15 percent to 20 percent, depending upon the level of sophistication, people familiar with the matter said. Chips produced on legacy nodes would face bigger price hikes, while new pricing would be applied from the second half of this year, they said, adding that Samsung has finished negotiating with some clients and is in discussions with others. Samsung’s decision
material SHORTAGE: Even as workers are about to return, Quanta lacks operating supplies, while Pegatron reported its lowest revenues in 11 quarters, the companies said Taiwan’s major Apple Inc supplier cut its outlook for the second quarter, joining a growing list of manufacturers warning about the fallout from lockdowns aimed at containing China’s worst COVID-19 outbreak in two years. Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦), which assembles MacBooks, expects a 20 percent quarterly fall in notebook shipments and a squeeze on margins this quarter due to the lockdown, a company representative said on Friday during an earnings call. The impact from supply chain disruptions could last until the end of the year, she said. The company’s Shanghai factory has been operating under tight restrictions since the middle of last month,
RSS