Report

Panel Maker Q2 2026 Earnings Preview

July 21, 2026

LG Display is scheduled to kick off the earnings season for flat panel display makers with Q2 2026 financial reports this week, to be followed by AUO and Samsung in the last week of July, a few more in the first weeks of August, and the Chinese panel makers’ mid-year interim reports, typically by the end of August. Here, we will give a preview of what to expect.

First, let us set the stage with an overview of operating margins in the industry. The chart here shows the operating margins of the larger companies in the industry since 2023. Compared to the severely negative margins in 2022 and 2023, the industry as a whole has been booking a small profit with a wide variance among the players.

SDC has continued to report positive operating margins and is immune to declines in LCD panel prices since it stopped all production of LCD in June 2022. SDC tends to follow a seasonal pattern of a slowdown in Q1-Q2 and a peak in Q3-Q4. Q1 2026 followed that pattern as OPM% dropped from 21% in Q4 2025 to 6% in Q1 2026. With higher shipments in Q2, this is likely to improve to the double digits %.
AUO and Innolux have been sensitive to LCD panel prices and have seen margins stabilize since 2024 at levels close to 0% but negative in most quarters.
LG Display has partially extracted itself from LCD commoditization and has reported an operating profit for five of the last six quarters. LGD is generating profit from OLED displays, but it is averaging in the low single digits %.
BOE reported its eleventh consecutive quarter of operating profits in Q1 2026. BOE’s average OPM since the beginning of 2024 has been 6%.
Sharp has consistently been the worst performer, but it has reduced its losses substantially since closing its Sakai Gen 10 fab.
Not shown on this chart is China Star, which does not report operating results for its divisions on a quarterly basis. However, in its 2025 annual report, TCL Technologies, the parent company of CSOT, reported that its display division had a net profit margin of 7%, similar to BOE but a little better.

Display Makers’ Quarterly Operating Margins, 2023-2026

Currency effects likely had a mixed impact on margins in the first quarter, as the Japanese yen and South Korean won depreciated against the dollar in the quarter, while the New Taiwan dollar was flat sequentially and the Chinese yuan strengthened in Q1 2026 (see table below). A weaker currency means that revenues from panel sales, which are usually made in US dollars, will translate to higher revenues in the local currency.

Currency	Q2 2026	Q1 2026	Q2 2025	QoQ	YoY
Japanese Yen	159.4	156.9	144.5	1.6%	9.4%
South Korean Won	1,502	1,466	1,398	2.4%	6.9%
Chinese Yuan	6.80	6.93	7.19	-1.8%	-5.4%
New Taiwan Dollar	31.6	31.6	29.7	0.0%	6.5%

In terms of guidance, companies were cautious about Q2 in April:

LGD expected area shipments to be up by about 10% sequentially, driven by an increase in TV panels. LGD expected average prices to decline by a low-to-mid 10 %, so it expected overall revenues to be down by a low-to-mid-single digit % QoQ.
AUO gave guidance for its three business segments, saying that the Display segment (49% of revenues in Q1 2026) would have a slight decline QoQ, while Mobility Solution (29% of sales in Q1 2026) would be up by a mid-single digit % QoQ and Vertical Solution Business (17% of revenues in Q1 2026) would be up by a high-single digit % QoQ. Although the company did not give an overall revenue guidance, the business segment guidance implies revenues to be up by a low single-digit % QoQ.
Innolux said that its non-display sector (35% of revenues in Q1 2026) would be flat QoQ, while commodity displays would be up by a low-single digit % and non-commodity displays would be down by a low-single digit % QoQ. Adding these up implies revenues to be slightly up QoQ.

Based on monthly revenue reports, AUO met its guidance with Q2 2026 revenues of NT$70.9 billion, up 3% QoQ. Innolux failed to meet its guidance with revenues of NT$63.6 billion, down 5% QoQ.

The table below shows analyst expectations for the panel makers for Q1 2026 with analyst coverage, according to marketscreener.com. The analyst expectations for margins see more improvements than declines in operating margins sequentially.

		Consensus Estimates for Q2 2026
Company	Currency	Revenues	Op. Profit	OPM	Net Income	Net Margin	Actual Revenues
AUO	TWD B	70.8	+0.9	+1%	0.8	+1%	69.0
BOE	CNY B	50.1	+2.7	+5%	+2.0	+4%
CSOT (TCL Tech)	CNY B	49.5	+2.7	+5%	+2.0	+4%
INX	TWD B	66.9	+1.5	+2%	+11.6	+16%	63.6
LGD	KRW B	5,527	-54	-1%	-224	-4%
Sharp	JPY B	433	6.6	+2%	4.7	+1%

Both AUO and Innolux’s revenues fell short of consensus, AUO by about 2% and Innolux by 5%.

Several of the Mainland Chinese panel makers issued preliminary figures for their financial performance in the first half of 2026. In the table below, the H1 2026 figures have been reported by the companies, while the Q2 figures are calculated by subtracting Q1 results. While China Star expects its Q2 2026 profits to increase substantially YoY, the other three in this group expect a worse profit picture. All four companies cited the slowdown in consumer electronics as a headwind due to the price increases for memory chips. Tianma and Visionox both reported a sharp decrease in prices for OLED panels for smartphones as a factor in driving those companies to net losses.

Company	Net Profit (B CNY)		Net Profit (B CNY)
	H1 2025	H1 2026	Q2 2025	Q2 2026
BOE	2.28	3.08 to 3.31	1.6	1.38 to 1.61
CSOT (TCL Tech)	1.56	2.92 to 3.14	0.87	1.36 to 1.58
Tianma	-0.25	-0.87 to -0.90	0.109	-0.73 to -0.76
Visionox	-1.06	-1.97 to -1.40	-0.53	-1.34 to -0.77

Perhaps more important than the results will be the guidance for the second half of 2026. We expect panel makers to be more cautious and more pessimistic than last quarter, as the geopolitical situation remains tenuous and the impact of memory prices has only deteriorated in the last three months.

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Author

Bob Obrien

Robert J (Bob) O’Brien joined Counterpoint Research as part of its acquisition of DSCC, where he was Co-Founder, Principal and CFO of DSCC. Bob has decades of experience turning market and business analysis into strategic insights in the display and electronics industries. At DSCC, Bob takes the lead role in analysis of display materials, including glass and AMOLED materials, and covers developments in TV and other large-screen display applications. He is the principal author of DSCC’s AMOLED Material Report, the Advanced TV Shipment Report, and the Display Glass Report, and Bob contributes regularly to the DSCC Weekly Review.