Say Samsung, and smartphones come to mind at once. Profitability there is slipping; ergo, Samsung’s shares must slip too. They are off 14 per cent from their January 2013 peak, and wobbled on Tuesday’s news that it only expects T$8.4tn ($7.9bn) in first-quarter operating profit. Yet Samsung is the most-loved big tech stock in the world, measured by analysts’ “buy” calls, beating Apple, and comfortably ahead of chipmaker TSMC at number two.

一谈到三星(Samsung)，脑海中马上浮现出智能手机。该业务的盈利能力正在下滑，因此，三星的股价也注定下滑。股价已从2013年1月的峰值下跌了14%，而本周二受三星一季度营运利润预期仅达8.4万亿韩元（合79亿美元）的消息影响，其股价再度下滑。尽管如此，按分析师的“买入”推荐衡量，三星仍是全球最受喜爱的大型科技股，打败苹果(Apple)，且遥遥领先于位居第二的芯片制造商台积电(TSMC)。

If phones struggle, what remains of Samsung is mostly chips and cash. It churns out mountains of both. The chip business could soon provide steadier profits and higher free cash flow. Samsung already dominates in memory chips, a sector that has stabilised. Its opportunity is in application processors, the brains of mobile devices. Samsung, now that Apple has taken its production elsewhere, has the capacity to compete as a contract manufacturer against the likes of TSMC. In an industry where investment matters, Samsung’s $41bn in net cash will help. TSMC is spending, amazingly, almost half of its sales on capital investment – but it still manages to make returns on investment that are broadly in line with Samsung’s.

如果手机业务陷入困境，三星的其余资产主要是芯片和现金。三星大量产出两者。芯片业务有望不久提供更稳定的利润和更多自由现金流。三星已经在内存芯片领域占据主导，该行业已企稳。对三星来说，机遇存在于应用处理器，即移动设备的大脑。既然苹果已将其生产转移至别处，三星就有产能以代工制造商的身份与台积电这样的企业展开竞争。在一个投资很重要的行业中，三星的410亿美元净现金会有帮助。令人惊奇的是，台积电正将其近一半的销售收入用于资本投资——但它仍能实现与三星相仿的投资回报率。

Optimism about Samsung (94 per cent of analysts rate it a “buy”) is supported by its valuation. It trades at seven times forecast earnings – half the average for big tech stocks. There are reasons for this: a heavy weighting in Korea’s Kospi index and its position in the tangled Samsung chaebol. The key to a re-rating will be unlocking the value of the cash – Korean companies and tech companies both tend to hoard cash; Samsung is both. The best outcome may be that Samsung finds another business which, like chips, is both capitally and technologically intensive, yet has a longer half-life than consumer gadgets. Is the world ready for a Samsung electric car to rival Tesla’s?

对三星的乐观分析（94%的分析师将其列为“买入”）获得其估值支持。当前股价是预期盈利的7倍——相当于其他大型科技股的一半。这是事出有因的：在韩国首尔综合指数(Kospi)中的较大权重，以及它在错综复杂的三星财阀集团内部的地位。重新估值的关键在于释放其现金的价值——韩国企业和科技企业都倾向于囤积现金；三星既是韩国企业又是科技企业。最好的结果可能是，三星找到和芯片相仿的另一个业务，即是资本密集型又是技术密集型，却有比消费电子产品更长的半衰期。世界准备好迎接叫板特斯拉(Tesla)的三星电动车了吗？