KUALA LUMPUR, April 3 — The current strengthening of the US dollar to the ringgit will positively enhance earnings of semi-conductor companies given their export-oriented earnings profile, said Kenanga Research.

However, the research firm did not expect general improvement to be reflected in the technology companies under its coverage, despite solid recovery momentum registered in the global semi-conductor sales.

In January 2014, global semi-conductor sales posted growth of 8.8 per cent year-on-year to US$26.3 billion, with overall improvement seen in all the segments.

“We are keeping our conviction that companies with high exposure on resilient products such as the smartphone and tablets segment as well as automotive segment will likely continue from the tech up-cycle,” said Kenanga.

It added that growth in the hard disk drive (HDD) would likely remain flat in 2014 in light of the overall slower consumer spending in desktop HDD and mobile HDD. — Bernama