Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp reported record revenue and soaring profits in 2021, with prices buoyed by a global chip shortage that outweighed the impact of US sanctions.
China’s biggest chipmaker saw a 39 per cent increase in sales on the previous year, posting a record $5.4bn for 2021. Sales for the three months to December also hit a record, exceeding $1.5bn for the first time.
Sales volumes also rose in the final quarter of the year by 22 per cent compared with the same period in 2020, reflecting rising semiconductor prices.
The company said it had an “exceptional year”, benefiting from global and domestic demand for chips, which helped it to overcome the challenges posed by being placed on Washington’s “entity list”, which restricts its access to US technologies, at the end of 2020. It added that it would continue to invest heavily in 2022 to increase capacity and volume
The global chips race has been gathering pace in recent months, with Taiwan’s TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, committing $44bn in capital expenditure to increasing its lead in capacity over its competitors.
SMIC on Friday also projected an increase in capex but it lagged behind its bigger Taiwanese rival significantly, dedicating $5bn dollars in spending in 2022, an increase of just under 11 per cent on the year before.
Quarterly operating profit surged 153 per cent compared with the same period a year earlier to $578mn, while full-year profit rose more than fourfold to just under $1.4bn. That earned the company $0.07 per share for the quarter, a rise of 57 per cent compared with the year before.
SMIC shares rose as much as 4.7 per cent on Friday, ahead of the CSI 300 index of Shanghai- and Shenzhen-listed stocks, which fell as much as 0.8 per cent.
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