Samsung announces $9.56 billion profit in latest record-breaking quarter

Samsung was predicting record revenue for the third fiscal quarter of 2013, and as usual it didn’t disappoint. The company has announced 59.08 trillion won (approximately $55.59 billion) in revenue, along with consolidated operating profit of 10.16 trillion won (roughly $9.56 billion). That’s actually more than Samsung’s guidance, with both figures representing new highs for the company. The operating profit came in at 7 percent higher than in the previous quarter, and was a whopping 26 percent up from the same period last year.

The real question, of course, is smartphone sales. Samsung CEO JK Shin recently touted that the Galaxy S4 had moved 40 million units in its first 6 months on the market, and in today’s announcements the company reveals it saw an increase in smartphone shipments of around 10 percent. While that is a mild bump up from the 9 percent that had investors and analysts worried earlier this year, the figure will do little to calm the growing concern that growth in the profitable, high-end smartphone market is plateauing. Samsung’s own numbers drive the point home even further: despite the uptick in sales, the company’s IT & Mobile Communications division saw revenue increase by just 3 percent.

It was in fact Samsung’s semiconductor business that saw the biggest growth during the quarter, with sales of memory for mobile devices and gaming consoles driving revenue up 12 percent from the previous quarter. Its display panel business was less fortunate, with lack of demand for new TVs and displays causing operating profits to drop 12 percent.