Samsung Announces Q2 Earnings Preview: Operating Profit Surges 19-Fold Year-on-Year, But Share Price Drops Over 6% After Opening.

TradingKey - On July 7, Samsung Electronics announced its earnings guidance for the second quarter of 2026. The company expects its revenue for this quarter to reach 171 trillion KRW, which is significantly lower than the market's prior consensus estimate of 172.181 trillion KRW. In contrast to the worse-than-expected revenue, the company's operating profit reached approximately 89.4 trillion KRW. Compared to the same period last year, Samsung's operating profit surged by about 19 times, setting a new record high for the company's quarterly operating profit.

This massive profit growth was primarily driven by improvements in its semiconductor business. As demand for AI servers continues to grow, causing prices for memory chips such as DRAM, NAND, and High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) to rise, the profitability of Samsung's memory chip business has recovered significantly. Samsung's operating profit for the first quarter had already reached 57.2 trillion KRW, and the Q2 guidance implies that the company's earnings have continued to improve on a quarter-on-quarter basis.

Samsung Electronics Daily Stock Chart, Source: TradingView

However, following the release of the earnings guidance, Samsung Electronics' stock price did not open strong. During early trading in the Korean stock market, Samsung Electronics dropped by over 6% at one point. Although the intraday decline subsequently narrowed, it remained in a weak and volatile state overall. The South Korean KOSPI index also came under pressure, indicating short-term profit-taking in the semiconductor sector after the positive earnings news materialized.

Samsung Electronics will release its full second-quarter financial results on July 30, at which time the specific performance of various business divisions, including semiconductors, mobile, displays, and consumer electronics, will be disclosed.