LONDON – For the second month in a row, strong growth in the Americas region pushed the three-month average of worldwide semiconductor sales to increase at above typical seasonal rates. The averaged sales reached $25.73 billion in November 2012, up 2.0 percent from October 2012 and up 2.0 percent from November 2011, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association trade group.
The Americas region sales of chips in November showed a sequential growth of 5.1 percent and annual growth of 9.7 percent. Growth in the Americas and Asia-Pacific regions more than made up for weakness in Europe and Japan (see chart below). However, what appears set to be a growth fourth quarter is still unlikely to overcome the weakness of the first nine months of 2012 or overturn the SIA's prediction that the 2012 chip market will contract compared with 2011.
"The global semiconductor industry navigated difficult macroeconomic conditions in 2012, but encouraging growth led by the Americas in recent months has the industry pointed in the right direction heading into 2013," said Brian Toohey, president and CEO of the SIA, in a statement. "To ensure that the industry’s momentum continues, Congress should remove ongoing economic uncertainty by enacting long-term, reliable fiscal policies that boost America’s economic strength and global competitiveness."
Monthly data is given by the SIA as a three-month average although the source of the data, the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization, tracks actual monthly data. The SIA and other regional semiconductor industry bodies opt to use averaged data because it smoothes out the actual data that typically show troughs at the beginnings of the quarters and peaks at the ends of the quarters.
Click on image to enlarge.Global three-month average chip sales for November 2012 by region in U.S. dollar billions. Source SIA.
Related links and articles: www.sia-online.org
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