TSM reports tomorrow. For those interested, here is the latest upgrade:
Credit Lyonnais upgrades TSMC to ‘buy’
Andrea Cheng, Taipei; Jane Wang, DigiTimes.com [Monday 21 October 2002]
On the eve of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company’s (TSMC) third-quarter investors conference, analysts are expecting the company’s fourth-quarter revenues to slide from the third quarter by about 8-12%, but a Credit Lyonnais analyst sees brighter prospects for the first quarter of 2003.
Ming-Kai Cheng, a semiconductor analyst at Credit Lyonnais, upgraded his rating on TSMC to “buy” on October 18. He is the first analyst to upgrade following the forecast by TSMC chairman Morris Chang on July 25 of a pause in the recovery.
According to IC design houses, TSMC’s December book-to-bill (B/B) ratio will be greater than 1, indicating a warming up in orders in the first quarter of next year.
Climbing revenues at chip packaging firms in the second half indicate that the overly abundant inventories at TSMC and other foundries from the second quarter are poised to drop to a low level, Cheng added.
Moreover, TSMC’s troubled 0.13-micron technology has finally had a breakthrough and has passed verification at major customers like Nvidia, Altera, ATI Technologies and Motorola, nudging toward lower inventory and a brighter first quarter for the world’s largest contract chip manufacturer once these companies start production using at the smaller node, said Cheng.
Cheng, previously working in investor relations at United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) before joining Credit Lyonnais two years ago, predicts that the foundry market will see an upturn by the middle of next year.
TSMC stock closed at NT$45.5 per share on October 21, down 2.2% from NT$46.5 on Friday. It had risen 30.3% last week.
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