Samsung Electronics' operating profit drops 25% in Q2

South Korea's Samsung Electronics, the world's largest maker of memory chips, said Friday its second- quarter operating profit dropped 25 percent from a year earlier. Operating profit posted 3.75 trillion won (3.56 billion U.S. dollars) during the April-June period, down 25 percent from a record 5.01 trillion won a year ago, Samsung said in a regulatory filing. It was in line with the company's preliminary estimate of 3.7 trillion won announced earlier this month. Second-quarter revenue increased 4 percent on-year to 39.44 trillion won, but net profit contracted 18 percent to 3.51 trillion won. Samsung's poor earnings have been widely expected as weaker demand for TVs and PCs drove down prices of memory chip and flat panel. "Earnings growth at Samsung Electronics is projected to be slower in the second quarter due to a delay in display market rebound amid weaker TV demand, and a sharp downturn in the semiconductor sector amid sluggish PC demand," Kim Young-chan, an analyst at Shinhan Investment Corp, said before the release.