Socionext

Research evidence excerpt

Socionext

Global Markets Research

16 July 2026Socionext

6526.T 6526 JP / EQUITY: JAPAN INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS

RatingUpdating our forecasts Remains Neutral

Target price

Increased from 2,400 JPY 2,500We expect earnings to bottom in 27/3 H1 and pick up again from H2

Closing price

We keep our Neutral rating on mix of good prospects for automotive and data 15 July 2026 JPY 2,572.0

center demand but fiercer competition too

We nudge up our profit forecasts for Socionext, mainly to reflect new forex assumptions. Implied upside -2.8%

Earnings appear likely to remain weak through 27/3 H1 because of slow improvements in

margins on new automotive products in China and persistently weak demand for other

applications. We then expect earnings to pick up from 27/3 H2 on contributions from

automotive products in North America and CPUs for data centers. While we still expect Relative performance chart

earnings growth from 28/3 onwards, we think growth will be slightly slower than at sector

peers, which should see even stronger growth in products for AI accelerators. We raise

our target price by 4% to reflect the upward revision to our 28/3 EPS forecast but retain

our Neutral rating.

We estimate weak earnings in 27/3 Q1 on q-q fallback

We estimate 27/3 Q1 (Apr–Jun) sales of ¥49.0bn (down 17% q-q, up 42% y-y) and

operating profits of ¥2.0bn (down ¥3.05bn). We attribute this to a fallback from

concentrated demand for smart devices and automotive applications in China at the end of

26/3 Q4. While conditions within the semiconductor industry as a whole look to have

remained favorable, with strong demand for data center and AI applications and a

recovery in the inventory cycle for automotive and industrial machinery applications,

conditions for Socionext still look less hospitable.