ASML Falls In Silicon Earnings Soup (ASML)

Investing

Published: January 16, 2008 7:33 am

Chip-equipment supplier ASML Holding NV (NASDAQ: ASML) is seeing shares under pressure after it posted earnings out of The Netherlands this morning. ASML posted flat results with a net profit of some 206 million Euro’s or about $302.9 million in currency conversions. Sales were 973 million Euro’s or about $1.4 Billion after currency conversions.

The company is also cautious ahead and is not forecasting growth of lithography machines this quarter. Its CEO Eric Meurice noted that independent market researchers still see gains in 2008 but it is awaiting confirmation via levels of bookings in Q1 and Q2. This is despite the fact that the belief is there that customers need ASML’s new products, and the company’s backlog fell a few percentage points down to 1.7 Billion Euros (from 1.77 Billion).

Shares of ASML are trading down 12.2%at $24.18 pre-market on fairly thin volume in the U.S., although shares were down 11% on more active trading overseas. This level at least in the U.S. will represent a new 52-week low that hasn’t actually been seen since August 2006.

Jon C. Ogg
January 16, 2008

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