TOKYO/TAIPEI (Reuters) -Shares of Taiwan’s Foxconn and Sharp Corp, the Japanese electronics maker it holds a 34% stake in, fell on Friday after Sharp reported a $1.9 billion loss on write-downs of its panel display business and other assets.
Sharp’s shares were down 7% early on Friday at 921 yen, on track for their biggest one-day loss since February, while Foxconn’s shares dropped 2.4%.
Foxconn, the world’s largest contract electronics maker, on Thursday attributed a 56% slump in first-quarter profit to a T$17.3 billion ($563.83 million) writedown related to its stake in Sharp and said visibility for the full year was limited.
Foxconn’s net profit of T$12.8 billion was much worse than an average forecast of T$29.18 billion in profit from 13 analysts, according to Refinitiv.
It said it expected revenues for cloud and networking products in 2023 to be flat amid a sluggish economy, compared to a previous forecast of significant growth for those sectors.
Sharp said it took a hit of 220 billion yen ($1.6 billion) as it wrote down the value of building and machinery in both its LCD and OLED display businesses in Japan, and other assets.
Foxconn said it would seek an explanation from the Japanese electronics firm and “work harder on the management of our investment businesses.”
($1 = 135.0500 yen)
($1 = 30.6830 Taiwan dollars)
(Reporting by David Dolan; Editing by Jacqueline Wong and Jamie Freed)
