ASML Q4 net profit $1.98 billion, sees sales up 25% in 2023

VELDHOVEN, Netherlands (Reuters) -ASML Holding NV, an equipment supplier to computer chip makers, on Wednesday reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter earnings and forecast sales growth of more than 25% in 2023.

Europe’s largest technology company, which has struggled to meet demand as top customers TSMC, Samsung (KS:) and Intel (NASDAQ:) are all engaged in major expansions, said its order backlog had grown to a record 40 billion euros ($43.62 billion) at the end of the year.

CEO Peter Wennink said that although the economic outlook for 2023 is clouded by worries over the economy and growing semiconductor inventories, customers also see conditions improving toward the end of the year and China’s economy recovering after the end of COVID-19 curbs.

“That means that the demand is still higher than what we can make,” he said.

The numbers come a week after U.S. President Joe Biden and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte discussed possible new export restrictions on sales of ASML’s older equipment to customers in China due to security concerns. But Wennink said that so far “nothing has changed” since the U.S. imposed new export restrictions on its own companies in October.

“We can still ship DUV (older) … tools” to mainland China, which vies with the U.S. as the company’s third-largest market after Taiwan and South Korea, Wennink said.

The Veldhoven, Netherlands based firm reported fourth-quarter net profit of 1.82 billion euros, up from net profit of 1.77 billion euros in the same period a year earlier, on revenue of 6.43 billion euros.

Analysts had forecast net profit of 1.70 billion euros on sales of 6.38 billion euros, according to Refinitiv data.

($1 = 0.9169 euros)