Semiconductor Industry Trying to Survive

Tony Daltorio, The Investment U Research Team

The financial downturn and global recession has hit the semiconductor industry hard.

Orders for microchips were almost non-existent at the end of 2008 as computers and mobile phones languished unsold on retailers’ shelves.

According to the Semiconductor Industry Association, global semiconductor sales fell 2.8 percent last year and are expected to fall a further 21.5 percent to $195.6 billion this year.

Despite the positive reaction in the stock market to the latest sales figures from Intel (INTC),the world’s biggest chipmaker, the numbers were mixed at best. Intel did enjoy a sales revival driven by consumers buying cheaper, smaller netbooks, but revenues fell in Europe and sales in the key business customer area were weak.

Let’s take a closer look at the semiconductor industry for profit opportunities.

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Philippine export growth accelerated to a four-month high in June as a weaker peso made the country's disk drives and mobile-phone chips cheaper and shipments to China countered weakening demand from the U.S. Shipments abroad rose 8.3 percent from a year earlier to $4.49 billion, compared with a 2.3 percent gain in May, according to preliminary figures released by the National Statistics Office in Manila today.The peso, last year's best performer in the region, fell for a fourth month in June, boosting the foreign-currency earnings of exporters.Overseas sales account for about two-fifths of the Philippines' $118 billion economy, which grew at the slowest pace in six quarters in the first three months of the year. Sales of electronics, which make up two-thirds of the Philippines' total exports, climbed 6.4 percent from a year earlier to $2.63 billion.Philippine shipments to China rose 8.8 percent in ...