14 DAY TRIAL // According to iSuppli, liquid crystal display panels do not appear to be as unfortunate as semiconductors, and definitely not in the same boat as NAND and DRAM products.
Based on some recently published financial estimates from IHS iSuppli, LCD prices are not going down anymore, at least not as fast as a few months ago.
Before December 2011, LCD panel prices had been falling sharply each month.
More precisely, during the July-November period, prices fell by a lot, until they started to cease plummeting, to an extent, in October (3-4%) and then November (0.5%).
That said, December showed a decrease of only 0.1% for screens of 10.1-55 inches in diagonal.
“The firming in panel prices in December can be attributed to lean inventories throughout the supply chain and to lower factory utilization rates, after suppliers were forced to cut production in order to control supply and stem financial losses,” said Sweta Dash, senior director for LCDs at IHS.
“Sales also picked up in the United States and China, helping to further boost the market. Despite this, there will be little opportunity for suppliers to increase pricing even after the market has evened out, due to continuing uncertainties in the global economy. Chinese demand also is expected to decline after the Lunar New Year sales season in January, preventing prices from increasing.”
It was during May and June 2011 that large-size LCD panels last came close to the December price average.
Still, this piece of news is not precisely encouraging. While it does mean that the supply-demand relationship has recovered somewhat, the fact remains that prices are still quite low, compared to what companies would like at least.
There is little chance that consumers will complain about more affordable TVs and monitors, though, especially in a time when other essential products, like HDDs, are in a bind.