LG Display second-quarter net profit rises 51 percent amid record sales

LG Display 2Q net profit jumps 51 percent

SEOUL, South Korea — LG Display, the world’s second-largest manufacturer of liquid crystal displays used in flat screen televisions and other products, said second-quarter net profit rose 51 percent amid record sales and higher prices for its products.

LG Display earned 555 billion won ($461 million) in the three months ended June 30, it said Thursday in a regulatory filing, its fifth straight quarter in the black. The company posted a net profit of 367 billion won a year earlier. Sales rose 35.2 percent to 6.45 trillion won from 4.77 trillion won a year earlier.

The company’s average selling price per square meter of display area shipped, an industry benchmark, was $863 in the second quarter, or 3 percent higher than the first quarter, the company said in a release.

Seoul-based LG Display Co. also said that it shipped 6.45 million square meters of display area in the second quarter, up 5 percent from the previous quarter.

LG Display also manufactures LCDs used in computer monitors, laptops and mobile phones. It competes with South Korean rival Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s biggest manufacturer of LCDs.

Looking ahead, LG Display expects total display area shipments to rise in the current third quarter by a low-to-mid teens percentage from the second, the company said in the release. It also expects the average selling price, however, to decline gradually before stabilizing or rebounding from about September, the release said.

Shares in LG Display, which released earnings results after the stock market closed, fell 3 percent to close at 35,400 won. The shares gained 87 percent in 2009.