The setup
Samsung Electronics reported consolidated sales of ₩195.3T (~US$144.7B) for the third quarter and operating profit of ₩107.4T (~US$79.6B), a 55.0% operating margin. Sales rose 14% on the quarter and 127% on the year; operating profit rose 20% and 783%. It is the fourth quarter in a row of record sales and record operating profit, and the company says it is the first technology company anywhere to clear ₩100T of operating profit in a quarter. Put the headline against its own history: Samsung earned ₩43.7T of operating profit in the whole of 2025, across four quarters of ₩6.7T, ₩4.7T, ₩12.2T and ₩20.1T. The September quarter alone is 2.46 times that year.
Almost none of it came from anywhere but chips. The Device Solutions (DS) division made ₩106.5T (~US$78.9B) of operating profit on ₩147.1T of sales, a 72.4% margin, which is 99.2% of the company's operating profit. Inside DS, the Memory Business sold ₩140.7T (~US$104.2B), 95.6% of the division. The phone, TV and appliance division (DX) lost ₩0.8T on ₩52.1T of sales. Samsung Display (SDC) made ₩1.1T on ₩8.0T and Harman ₩0.6T on ₩4.3T.
The record is real, and it is also the least interesting thing on the page. The preliminary figures came out on , so the headline was known for three weeks. What added was the split, and the split says something the headline hides. Samsung's memory sales rose 16.5% in the quarter. SK hynix, reporting the day before, grew 31.9%. In won, SK hynix added ₩25.3T of revenue and Samsung's memory business added ₩19.9T. The company with the biggest memory factory in the world took the smaller share of the quarter's increment, on a slower DRAM price increase and slower DRAM bit growth than its smaller rival.
Hold that frame for the rest of the page. Samsung's record is the industry's price arriving at the largest seller. The question the next print answers is whether Samsung's own volume turns, and management has given a number to test that against: DRAM bits up in the "mid-to-high" teens in the December quarter. The shares closed at ₩230,500 (~US$170.74) on , down 4.75% on the day, with the preferred shares down 3.79% to ₩182,900. Press coverage tied the drop to net profit of ₩75.1T against a FnGuide consensus near ₩87.4T.
The numbers
| ₩ trillions | 3Q25 | 2Q26 | 3Q26 | Q/Q | Y/Y |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sales | 86.1 | 171.5 | 195.3 | +14% | +127% |
| Gross profit | 33.5 | 119.3 | 135.3 | 69.3% margin | 38.9% a year ago |
| SG&A incl. R&D | 21.3 | 29.8 | 27.8 | 14.2% of sales | 24.8% a year ago |
| of which R&D | 8.8 | 16.0 | 14.4 | -10% | +63% |
| Operating profit | 12.2 | 89.5 | 107.4 | +20% | +783% |
| Finance income/(expense) | 1.2 | 4.7 | (9.5) | swing of ₩14.2T on the quarter | |
| Net profit | 12.2 | 71.6 | 75.1 | +5% | 38.5% margin |
| DS sales / operating profit | 33.1 / 7.0 | 127.5 / 89.2 | 147.1 / 106.5 | +15% sales | +344% sales |
| Memory sales | 26.7 | 120.8 | 140.7 | +16% | +427% |
| DX sales / operating profit | 48.4 / 3.5 | 48.0 / (0.8) | 52.1 / (0.8) | +8% sales | +8% sales |
| Operating cash flow | 22.6 | 105.1 | 98.6 | 1.31 times net profit | |
| Net cash at quarter-end | 91.8 | 167.6 | 197.6 | cash ₩214.8T, debt ₩17.2T | |
All figures are from the third-quarter earnings-call deck, Appendix 1 to 4, on a K-IFRS consolidated basis and before the external review is complete. EPS was ₩11,462 per common share, up 6% on the quarter. Division sales include intersegment sales, so DS, DX, SDC and Harman add to ₩211.5T against consolidated sales of ₩195.3T. Samsung reports R&D inside SG&A; the ₩27.8T line contains the ₩14.4T.
The board declared a third-quarter dividend of ₩4,601 per common and per preferred share, ₩30T (~US$22.2B) in total. Of the ₩90T to ₩110T the company estimates it will return to shareholders for 2026, ₩35T is "already planned or completed," which leaves ₩55T to ₩75T for a "substantial" repurchase-and-cancellation program and further dividends, to be set at the board meeting in late . Capital expenditure was ₩29T (~US$21.5B) in the quarter, ₩27.2T of it in DS, and the full-year plan is about ₩84.4T (~US$62.5B).
A note on currency. Samsung reports in won and sells chips in dollars. This page converts at about ₩1,350 to the US dollar, approximate, which is close to the rate press coverage used to convert the headline (₩107.44T to US$80.5B). The won strengthened through the quarter; the second-quarter page converted at about ₩1,480, and management put the foreign-exchange drag on operating profit at about ₩10T against the second quarter, per a summary of the call.
The rest of this dive is for paid subscribers.
The headline numbers are above. The 14 sections below carry the mechanism, the peer read, the valuation work, and the dated tests that decide it.
- The increment went to SK hynix
- The margin came from SG&A, not from the fab
- The captive buyer pays the memory bill
- Foundry's recovery is mostly memory buying from itself
- The line below the line: the won, the finance loss and the equity gap
- The cost line the capex writes
- Cash, returns and who gets paid
- Connecting the dots
- The guide and the December bar
- Valuation
- The strongest case against this read
- What we'd watch
- The trade (analysis, not advice)
- Bottom line
Not ready to pay? Get the free Monday issue and one full dive a week by email.
Already a subscriber? Sign in.