Skip to main content

'Green Shoots' in the Semiconductor sector?

For those who are still searching for "green shoots", there is some good news from the semiconductor sector today.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) announced today that May semiconductor revenues worldwide were up 5.4% over April. That's the good news. The bad news is that revenues are still down over 23% on a year-over-year basis.

The chart from SIA covering 1996 to the present follows:

Worldwide Semiconductor Revenues
As SIA President George Scalise commented, "The May sales numbers reflect the third-consecutive month of sequential growth for the semiconductor industry." He added that "The sequential monthly increases lead us to be cautiously optimistic about a return to normal seasonal patterns for the industry going forward."

Looking closer to home, sales in the Americas have also been up three months in a row. The chart below shows an over 5% gain from February to March with April growth slowing down and May showing another decent pick-up.

Semiconductor Revenues for the Americas
An important component of tech sector growth --

Since many observers consider semiconductor sales to be somewhat of a leading indicator for the overall tech sector, it is a welcome sign to see some consistent growth. A return to "normal seasonal patterns" implies even better growth in the months ahead.

After the stinky employment numbers reported on Thursday, any good news we can find is certainly appreciated. Let's hope those "green shoots" in the semiconductor sector continue to sprout.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Trade Radar gets another update

Some of our data sources changed again and it impacted our ability to load fundamental/financial data. In response, we are rolling out a new version of the software: 7.1.24 The data sourcing issues are fixed and some dead links in the Chart menu were removed. So whether you are a registered user or someone engaged in the free trial, head over to our update page and download the latest version. The update page is here:   https://tradingstockalerts.com/software/downloadpatch Contact us if you have questions or identify any new issues.
Post a Comment
Read more

Unlock Stock Market Profits - Key #4

This is the fourth article in a series of posts describing 10 tools to help you identify and evaluate good investing ideas. It is based on a post that provides a summary of the ten keys that individual investors should use to identify profitable stock trades. ( Click here to read the original post ) With this fourth post, we will continue another step along the path of finding stocks that seem to have some potential. The first post in the series discussed how to use unusual activity to identify investing ideas. The second post described how to use stock screeners. The third post described how to use lists of new highs and new lows. This post will focus on identifying social or business trends in order to find investing ideas. Information on new trends might turn up anywhere. In conversation with friends or business associates, in newspapers or magazines, on TV or though your work. The key is to be aware of trends and how they start, stop or change. We'll start by describing what...
6 comments
Read more

Pick 'o the Month - a two'fer

Usually I focus on a single smaller, more obscure stock. In this case, I would like to submit two stocks, a large-cap, Cisco Systems ( CSCO ), and a small-cap, Big Band Networks ( BBND ). These two stocks embody a resurgence in the network infrastructure space. That theme is what ties these two picks together. With the rising tide of video, music and movies downloaded over the Internet and cable companies offering bundled TV, phone and Internet, we have finally absorbed the glut of network capacity created during the Internet bubble. This deluge of multimedia is changing service providers’ business models, and the ways they manage and develop networks. The focus now is on how to move, manage and monetize content that is richer and more complex than ever before. In response, as telecommunications companies ramp up newer, faster networks to handle all this traffic, Cisco Systems is a prime beneficiary. As the dominant player in network infrastructure, it has already seen profits begin to...
1 comment
Read more