Samsung Electronics posted record-breaking quarterly earnings on Tuesday that far exceeded market expectations. The company reported preliminary operating profit of 57.2 trillion won for the January to March period. Revenue reached 133 trillion won during the same three months. Operating profit jumped 755 percent from 6.69 trillion won a year earlier. Revenue rose 68.1 percent from 79.14 trillion won in the previous year. The AI memory boom has clearly transformed Samsung’s financial trajectory.
The first quarter results surpassed the company’s previous record set in late 2025. Samsung had logged 93.8 trillion won in revenue during the fourth quarter of last year. Operating profit for that period stood at 20.1 trillion won. The new quarterly revenue topped the 100 trillion won mark for the first time in company history. Operating profit for this single quarter exceeded Samsung’s full-year earnings of 43.6 trillion won in 2025. The AI memory boom has created an unprecedented earnings surge.
The figures came in well above market expectations. Analysts had raised their forecasts to around 120 trillion won in revenue. They had expected approximately 50 trillion won in operating profit. Samsung’s actual results represent one of the company’s largest earnings surprises on record. While Samsung did not disclose divisional breakdowns, analysts attribute the performance to semiconductors. The memory division particularly drove these exceptional results. Tight supply across end markets pushed prices up by double-digit rates. The AI memory boom shows no signs of slowing down.
Brokerages estimate operating profit from the chip division between 37 trillion won and 48 trillion won. Industry officials expect the uptrend to continue through the rest of the year. Further price increases will likely drive earnings higher in coming months. According to market tracker TrendForce, DRAM prices rose 90 to 95 percent in the first quarter. This increase compared to the previous quarter represents a dramatic jump. Prices are projected to climb another 60 percent in the second quarter. Some forecasts point to DRAM prices surging as much as 250 percent this year compared to 2025. The AI memory boom continues to reshape pricing dynamics across the industry.
Kim Sun-woo, an analyst at Meritz Securities, offered his perspective on Samsung’s strategy. Samsung pursued an aggressive and proactive pricing strategy in the commodity memory market, Kim stated. He noted that the current memory cycle is approaching the midpoint of a supercycle. The company’s outsized earnings are likely to drive a rerating of its stock. Brokerages have turned increasingly bullish on Samsung’s outlook following this report.
KB Securities raised its forecast for Samsung’s annual operating profit to 327 trillion won this year. The firm also projects 488 trillion won in operating profit for 2027. KB Securities set a target price of 360,000 won for Samsung shares. Kim Dong-won, head of research at KB Securities, provided a comparative analysis. The gap in projected operating profit between Nvidia and Samsung this year is only about 30 trillion won. Nvidia is expected to post 357 trillion won in operating profit. Samsung’s current market capitalization sits at about $830 billion. This figure represents just 19 percent of Nvidia’s $4.3 trillion valuation. It also equals about 57 percent of TSMC’s $1.5 trillion market cap. These figures suggest significant valuation upside for Samsung according to analysts.
Samsung’s share price edged up 0.73 percent to 194,500 won as of midday Tuesday. The stock had hit an intraday high of 209,500 won earlier in the session. Samsung has been expanding shipments of high-end memory to major technology companies. These customers include Nvidia, Google, and AMD for high-bandwidth memory products. The company has also begun mass production of next-generation HBM4 this year. These chips are expected to be used in Nvidia’s upcoming AI accelerator platform called Vera Rubin. The AI memory boom will likely continue as these new products enter the market.
