LG fourth quarter results are out: another record broken

LG have just published their financial results for the last three months of 2009 and they certainly have every right to be proud with them. The company has recorded their highest fourth quarter earnings ever, beating their previous best by about 7 percent. The sales of the conglomerate totaled 12.2 billion US dollars, while the operating profit rose to 382 million dollars.

The mobile division fared reasonably well, managing to sell 32 percent more mobile phones compared to Q4 of 2008. The 33.9 million units shipped give LG a global market share of about 11.3 percent, which is more than enough to reconfirm its status as the world's third largest phone manufacturer.

However the reported mobile phone sales totaled 3.3 billion US dollars, which is a 5 percent decrease compared to the last quarter of 2008. Its operating profit was 57 million dollars, resulting in a margin of merely 1.7 percent.

LG see their robust growth in North America, Europe and emerging markets (what's that - the whole world?) as the main reason for their market share increase and is targeting a further 19 percent increase in unit sales to 140 million in 2010. We are yet to see though if they will also be able to make more money out of it.

You can download the PDF file containing the full report right here.