
Still little Covid-19 impact as April chip market stayed strong . . . except in Europe
The global three-month average of chip sales in April was $34.43 billion, up 6.1 percent year-on-year. The growth was only down slightly from a 6.9 percent equivalent figure the month before.
It is noticeable that the Americas region market grew faster than before with year-on-year growth of 24.5 percent while the Chinese market – about one third of the global total – softened with growth down to 4.4 percent from 4.5 percent the year before. Europe however, is becoming the perennial weakness in the global market, with an annual market contraction of 7.1 percent.
It still seems likely that a global economic recession as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic will have an impact in the 3Q20. The question is then how long that recession will linger.
Three-month average of chip sales by geographic region for April and March 2020. Source: SIA/WSTS.
“Global semiconductor sales in April slipped slightly compared to the previous month, which is in line with seasonal trends, but significantly outpaced sales from April 2019,” said John Neuffer, CEO of SIA, in a statement. “The global semiconductor market through April has shown early signs of resilience to the economic turmoil caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, but significant uncertainty remains in the months ahead.”
Monthly data is given by the SIA as a three-month average although the source of the data, the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization (WSTS), tracks actual monthly data. The SIA and other regional semiconductor industry bodies opt to use averaged data because it evens out the actual data that typically shows troughs at the beginnings of quarters and peaks at the ends of quarters.
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Little sign of Covid-19 in March global chip sales data
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Global chip market starts year solid, faces economic threats
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