Shares of AU Optronics Corp (AUO, 友達光電), one of the nation’s largest flat panel makers, yesterday got a boost from an increase in sales in the third quarter of the year.
The shares outperformed the TAIEX after AUO American depositary receipts rose on the US market overnight, even though many US technology stocks ended in negative territory, dealers said.
AUO shares yesterday rose 0.81 percent to close at NT$12.50, with 23.10 million shares changing hands on the Taiwan Stock Exchange. The TAIEX closed up 0.10 percent at 10,466.83 points.
“The third quarter is a traditional peak season for the flat panel industry and that’s why suppliers like AUO enjoyed sales growth in the three-month period,” Mega International Investment Services Corp (兆豐國際投信) analyst Alex Huang (黃國偉) said.
In a statement released on Monday, AUO said its consolidated sales for the third quarter rose 8 percent quarter-on-quarter, but fell 7.3 percent from a year earlier to NT$81.04 billion (US$2.62 billion).
AUO posted NT$27.44 billion in consolidated sales last month, down 1.3 percent from a month earlier and 5.6 percent from a year earlier.
AUO said shipments of its large screens used in TVs, monitors and notebooks rose 6.5 percent from a quarter earlier to 29.79 million units in the third quarter.
The third-quarter figure was up 2.4 percent from a year earlier.
However, the firm reported a sequential decline of 6.1 percent in small and medium-sized screen shipments of 42.56 million units in the third quarter, 9.1 percent lower than a year earlier.
“AUO and other Taiwanese firms such as Innolux Corp (群創) largely benefited from relatively high yield rates in large panel production compared with their Chinese counterparts, so their shipments of TV panels with a size of more than 55 inches increased in the wake of rising demand in the third quarter,” Huang said.
AUO chairman Paul Peng (彭双浪) last month said that the company’s TV panel clients are expected to continue to build up their inventories in the fourth quarter, but he remains cautious about the possible impacts from escalating trade friction between the US and China.
In the second quarter, AUO posted earnings per share of NT$0.13, down from NT$0.45 in the first quarter due to falling sales.
In the wake of the increase in sales in the third quarter, market analysts said AUO is expected to see its bottom line improve this quarter.
AUO has scheduled an investor conference for Oct. 31.
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