Samsung Will Reportedly Cut DRAM and NAND Production Further After US$7 Billion Loss

[TheLostSwede]

Earlier today, Samsung released its Q2 results, which were a mixed bag with many business units underperforming. However, none were doing as poorly as Samsung's memory business which made a loss of 4.36 trillion Won or around US$3.4 billion. Although not mentioned in the financial report, Reuters are reporting that Samsung is looking to cut production of NAND and DRAM further, as the publication is pointing out that Samsung's chipset business as a whole lost a staggering 8.9 trillion Won or US$7 billion. That said, the loss wasn't quite as bad as in the first quarter of the year and Samsung is expected to cut the loss in half for Q3.

In a statement to Reuters, Samsung said "Production cuts across the industry are likely to continue in the second half, and demand is expected to gradually recover as clients continue to destock their (chip) inventory." This suggests that the expected recovery isn't going to happen as soon as the DRAM and NAND manufacturers expected, as there simply isn't enough demand for either product. SK Hynix has already announced that it's cutting production a further five to 10 percent for NAND, but the company doesn't appear to have had quite as big losses as Samsung. For the time being, this is good news for consumers, as RAM and SSD pricing is about as low as it has ever been. However, with production cuts from all the three major manufacturers of DRAM and NAND, prices will most likely start going up soon, especially as Samsung is said to have depleted most of its inventories.



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[Bwaze]

"For the time being, this is good news for consumers, as RAM and SSD pricing is about as low as it has ever been. However, with production cuts from all the three major manufacturers of DRAM and NAND, prices will most likely start going up soon, especially as Samsung is said to have depleted most of its inventories."

No, it's clearly not "good news for consumers" - it's verified by falling sales and falling revenue. Most of the consumers already have what the companies are offering. If they're offering the same things at half the price, it only shows most of the people they have vastly overpaid these products in recent years. Rising prices after that won't help, I'm sure.

 

[TheLostSwede]

"For the time being, this is good news for consumers, as RAM and SSD pricing is about as low as it has ever been. However, with production cuts from all the three major manufacturers of DRAM and NAND, prices will most likely start going up soon, especially as Samsung is said to have depleted most of its inventories."

No, it's clearly not "good news for consumers" - it's verified by falling sales and falling revenue. Most of the consumers already have what the companies are offering. If they're offering the same things at half the price, it only shows most of the people they have vastly overpaid these products in recent years. Rising prices after that won't help, I'm sure.

I'm just in the process of building a new system, so for me it has been mostly good news, except that I bought my RAM too early, it went down $16 in price three weeks later.
Obviously I regret getting an SSD I bought last year, as it's less than half the price now, but it's not as if anyone could've prediced that prices were going to go down this much.

 

[AnotherReader]

I'm just in the process of building a new system, so for me it has been mostly good news, except that I bought my RAM too early, it went down $16 in price three weeks later.
Obviously I regret getting a couple of SSDs I bought last year, as at least one of them is less than half the price now, but it's not as if anyone could've prediced that prices were going to go down this much.

I bought a SN850X a few months ago and thought it was a pretty good deal. Now it can sometimes be found at nearly 60% of what I paid.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I bought a SN850X a few months ago and thought it was a pretty good deal. Now it can sometimes be found at nearly 60% of what I paid.

Well, I got a 2TB Kingston KC3000 in early August last year, for what I thought was a good deal back then, as I got a decent discount, but the cheapest places in Taiwan has it for almost half of what I paid now, which is a bit annoying. 60% cheaper must be even more annoying.

Turns out I got the SATA drive in 2021 and it hasn't dropped as much in price, only about a third.

 

[AnotherReader]

Well, I got a 2TB Kingston KC3000 in early August last year, for what I thought was a good deal back then, as I got a decent discount, but the cheapest places in Taiwan has it for almost half of what I paid now, which is a bit annoying. 60% cheaper must be even more annoying. At least the other SSD was a SATA drive, so in comparison, it hasn't dropped as much in price.

I'm thinking about getting a couple of SSDs on the cheap just in case.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I'm thinking about getting a couple of SSDs on the cheap just in case.

Yeah, that's what I thought, twice. The SATA SSD was one of those buys, although it was really to replace the HDD in a Corsair One my other half dragged home from work, but never really uses.
Likewise with the Kingston, I didn't really need it, but I was moving country and they were 40 percent more expensive in Sweden, but alas...

That said, it seems like we're close to rock bottom now, with very good 2 TB drives going for around $100-120 and 1 TB drives going for $50-60.
Unless there's zero demand for the next year, I don't see prices dropping all that much further, as it's not sustainable long term.
Then again, with chinese competition in both SSD controllers and NAND, who knows.

 

[Jokii]

I just wish they would sell some reasonably cheap large SSDs (10+ TB ideally, but at least 4TB). I don't need them to be very fast, either.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I just wish they would sell some reasonably cheap large SSDs (10+ TB ideally, but at least 4TB). I don't need them to be very fast, either.

The 4TB PNY CS2241 is available in Taiwan for US$160 and has been for some time now. Haven't seen anything else getting even close to that price.

 

[kondamin]

now if only the same deflationary pressures were one their phones aswel

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

now if only the same deflationary pressures were one their phones aswel

They seem to have a lot of roaming deals depending on the phone.

 

[Super Firm Tofu]

The 4TB PNY CS2241 is available in Taiwan for US$160 and has been for some time now. Haven't seen anything else getting even close to that price.

This is getting pretty close, and I may grab one for a games drive. I just don't know much about Team's SSDs. I've had great luck with their DRAM though.

 

[kondamin]

They seem to have a lot of roaming deals depending on the phone.

those deals are pretty limited in europe.
Most people buy their phones from stores as providers tie those discounts with expensive extra data packages.

 

[Jokii]

The 4TB PNY CS2241 is available in Taiwan for US$160 and has been for some time now. Haven't seen anything else getting even close to that price.

1-2TB drives are still lower in price/TB than 4TB drives. Never mind larger ones, which are very expensive. So four 1TB drives cost less than one 4TB drive (same models). It's a bit silly.

I don't even need half the speed these SSDs offer, I just want to replace those damn HDDs.

 

[bonehead123]

For the time being, this is good news for consumers, as RAM and SSD pricing is about as low as it has ever been. However, with production cuts from all the three major manufacturers of DRAM and NAND, prices will most likely start going up soon, especially as Samsung is said to have depleted most of its inventories.

And as usual, a nice little factory fire/flood/power system malfunction at just the right moment will certainly help push prices upwards too

I've already stocked up on all the m.2's and ram sticks that I will need for my future upgrades and client builds over the next 6-12 months or so.... yea it was an investment, but with my biz growing like it is, I feel good about it

 

[mechtech]

Well, I got a 2TB Kingston KC3000 in early August last year, for what I thought was a good deal back then, as I got a decent discount, but the cheapest places in Taiwan has it for almost half of what I paid now, which is a bit annoying. 60% cheaper must be even more annoying.

Turns out I got the SATA drive in 2021 and it hasn't dropped as much in price, only about a third.

Same.

Still bummed that 4TB drives haven't followed 2TB price drops equally.

edit - maybe samsung would sell more drives if their prices were in line with others. No point getting a 980 pro if some corsair and KC3000, and other equivalents 30% cheaper.

 

[Bwaze]

The 4TB PNY CS2241 is available in Taiwan for US$160 and has been for some time now. Haven't seen anything else getting even close to that price.

And Crucial P3 Plus SSD 4TB can be had for about 160 - 170 € in Europe.

But we had 4 TB SSDs since ages ago, and in 2020 we already had our first low budget drive, Samsung SSD 870 QVO 4TB. Together with 8TB drive. It's mind boggling that new models of SSDs don't even offer the 4TB, and 8TB option is still limited (in consumer market) to that ancient slow Samsung SATA drive.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

And Crucial P3 Plus SSD 4TB can be had for about 160 - 170 € in Europe.

But we had 4 TB SSDs since ages ago, and in 2020 we already had our first low budget drive, Samsung SSD 870 QVO 4TB. Together with 8TB drive. It's mind boggling that new models of SSDs don't even offer the 4TB, and 8TB option is still limited (in consumer market) to that ancient slow Samsung SATA drive.

There is a NVMe 8TB option, two actually. Both from sabarent, the rocket 4 plus TLC and the rocket Q QLC.

I think most people just dont need the storage. We live in the cloud world now, everyone uploads everything instead of saving it locally these days. Those of us that horde digital data are fewer then ever.