SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co Ltd reported a 69% plunge in fourth-quarter profit on Tuesday, as consumer demand for electronic devices dropped and clients tightened their belts on a weak economy, dragging down memory chip prices.
The world’s biggest maker of memory chips and smartphones said October-December operating profit fell to 4.3 trillion won ($3.49 billion), its lowest quarterly profit in eight years, from 13.87 trillion won a year earlier.
That compared with the company’s own estimate of 4.3 trillion won earlier this month.
Revenue fell 8% to 70.5 trillion won.
($1 = 1,232.6000 won)
(Reporting by Joyce Lee and Heekyong Yang; Editing by Christopher Cushing)
