Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. said Thursday that fourth-quarter net profit rose to a new record thanks to growing demand for high-speed computing and better margins. The world’s largest contract chip maker
2330,
+0.41%
TSM,
+0.63%
said net profit for the quarter ended Dec. 31 rose 78% from a year earlier to 295.90 billion Taiwan dollars (US$9.72 billion). That beat the estimate of NT$288.08 billion from a poll of analysts by S&P Global Market Intelligence.
Fourth-quarter revenue increased 43% from a year earlier to NT$625.53 billion. Both quarterly revenue and net profit marked new record highs. For 2022, TSMC booked NT$2.264 trillion in revenue and NT$1.017 trillion in net profit — both highest on record. The company’s operating profit margin improved by 10.3 percentage points from a year earlier to 52.0% in the fourth quarter. While revenue from smartphones fell 4% from the previous quarter, revenue from high-performance computing increased 10%. TSMC said revenue from customers in North America accounted for 69% of the fourth-quarter total, down from 72% in the third quarter, while revenue from China made up 12%, up from 8% in the previous quarter. Write to Kosaku Narioka at kosaku.narioka@wsj.com