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Samsung forecasts 5.1 billion earnings for Q4, barely a third comes from mobile

By Daniel Petrov

Updated: Jan 08, 2016, 8:04 AM

Samsung

With rapid restructuring of both its corporate organization and product lines, Samsung managed to turn the ship around, and stabilize its sales and profits that were heading downwards after the flagship smartphone market started maturing a year or two ago. Granted, it doesn't post record $8 billion quarters like at this time in 2013, but $5.1 billion isn't too shabby either.

That's exactly the operating income that Samsung predicts it will report for this past Q4, reflecting a full quarter of Note 5 and Galaxy S6 edge+ sales, but also of the hundreds of other gadgets, big and small, as well as components like memory and displays that Samsung sells. Samsung's earnings forecasts stray very little from the actual audited results it posts a few weeks later, so this $5.1 billion figure would mean significant growth in earnings from the same quarter in 2014, yet about a 15% decline from the previous Q3 period in 2015.

The mobile unit of Samsung likely contributed to about a third of these earnings estimates, according to analysts' median estimates, which is both good and bad. Good, as it indicates that Samsung is weaning itself off its dependence on phone margins, which just two years ago reached up to 70% of its profits, but at the same time this shows that Samsung is feeling the pressure from value-for-money vendors like Xiaomi, Meizu and others, and the average selling price of its phones has diminished.

Samsung	Q4 2015	Q3 2015	Q4 2014	Q4 2013
Revenue (USD billion)	$45	$43	$44	$50
Earnings (USD billion)	$5.1	$6.14	$4.4	$8.3

source: Samsung & Bloomberg

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Daniel, a devoted tech writer at PhoneArena from 2010 to 2025, has been engrossed in mobile technology since the Windows Mobile era. His expertise spans mobile hardware, software, and carrier networks, and he's keenly interested in the future of digital health, car connectivity, and 5G. Beyond his professional pursuits, Daniel finds balance in travel, reading, and exploring new tech innovations, while contemplating the ethical and privacy implications of our digital future.