Samsung Electronics' (005930) first-quarter results this year are evaluated as having set a new milestone in Korean corporate history, going beyond a simple "earnings surprise." Just a week earlier, the average forecast from the securities industry was 40.2 trillion won, but when the results were revealed, operating profit reached 57.2 trillion won, exceeding market expectations by 42.3%. Looking at the company-wide operating profit margin (43%) for the first quarter alone, it is an unprecedented achievement that doubled compared to the previous quarter, and it is a historic record where a single quarter's operating profit exceeded the entire previous year's annual profit (43.6011 trillion won).
At the center of the strong results is the semiconductor (DS) division. The DS division's first-quarter operating profit surged more than threefold compared to the previous quarter (16.4 trillion won), estimated to have swept up approximately 53 trillion won of the total 57.2 trillion won.
Results were somewhat mixed across business units. DRAM and NAND flash appear to have driven record-breaking performance, generating massive profits of approximately 44 trillion won and 10 trillion won, respectively. On the other hand, non-memory businesses—foundry and System LSI—are estimated to have posted losses of approximately 1.5 trillion won due to delays in yield stabilization despite expanded utilization of advanced process nodes.
This performance is the result of a structural memory semiconductor "super cycle" taking full shape amid the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. As the AI industry has moved from traditional search-centric applications into an "agentic AI"-based inference market, data center demand has exploded. Global investment bank Citi noted, "Backed by robust AI inference memory demand, Samsung Electronics recorded an overwhelming earnings surprise," adding that "strong price increases centered on server DRAM drove the results."
