1. The semiconductor industry boomed as the world turns more digital. With demand rising and supply crunching (due to Covid), there was fear that prices may spike and products get delayed.
2. When it comes to semiconductor, investors would normally think of big players such as TSMC, Nvidia and AMD. But the industry is bigger than that, besides the chip designers and foundries, there are materials suppliers, equipment makers, and testers.
3. We have a handful of semiconductor stocks in Singapore who are part makers and testers. They have benefited from the boom even though they are small players – some have reported good results and a few excellent ones.
4. UMS, a precision part maker, reported a 65% and 49% growth in revenue and earnings respectively. The company doubled the final dividend from last year.
5. The surprise came from Global Testing, a Taiwanese-based tester, which saw its revenue and earnings jump 69% and 2,539% respectively. Yes, you read that right.
6. Global Testing is giving out a $0.20 dividend per share. Based on the share price of $0.60 before the announcement was released, the dividend yield would be 33%. The share price jumped to $0.91 or by 52% after the news was made public.
7. Another tester, Avi-Tech, saw solid growth in its half year results. Revenue was up 23% while profits jumped 71%. Dividend per share rose 50%.
8. In comparison, AEM and Micro-Mechanics saw muted results although they still enjoy slight growth in their businesses.
9. AEM had 9% revenue growth but a 6% decline in earnings. Micro-Mechanics saw an 11% revenue growth and a 5% net profit increment.
10. The results went against the fear of global chip shortage. It seems like the world is humming along well and the results from these semiconductor players showed no impact.
11. Maybe we are using the reserves or that the supply bottleneck has not cascaded downstream yet.
