Global semicon sales forecast: Cowan LRA model

This is a continuation of my coverage of the fortunes of the global semiconductor industry. I would like to acknowledge and thank Mike Cowan, an independent semiconductor analyst and developer of the Cowan LRA model, who has provided me the latest numbers.

The WSTS posted July 2011's HBR (Historical Billings Report) on its website last Sunday, September 04, 2011 thereby allowing the monthly update of the latest global semiconductor sales forecast estimates for 2011 and 2012 via exercising the Cowan LRA forecasting model that reflects July 2011's monthly sales numbers including any sales revisions to previously reported sales results.

According to the WSTS's July HBR, July's actual sales came in at $23.495 billion with a corresponding July 3MMA sales at $24.850 billion.Source: Cowan LRA model, USA.

It should be highlighted that the previous five months (February through June) experienced varying upward sales revisions from last month's published HBR, as highlighted in the table here. Thus, the total YTD cumulative sales revision is upward by almost $1.0 billion bringing the YTD sales through July to $174.055 billion. This represents a 2011 YTD sales growth of 3.2 percent compared to the same time period in 2010.

The Cowan LRA model's sales forecast estimates for July as determined by last month's model run were $24.410 billion (actual) and$25.007 billion (3MMA), respectively. Consequently, the model's July MI (Momentum Indicator) came in at minus 3.7 percent which "improved" from last month's MI of minus 7.9 percent. This indicates (mathematically speaking) that the semiconductor industry's July actual sales came in lower than the model's previous month's forecasted expectation by $0.915 billion and 2011's sales growth could continue to trend downward for the rest of this year all be it at a slower rate compared to last month's MI.

Plugging the latest actual sales numbers abstracted from the July HBR into the forecasting model produces the following updated sales and sales growth forecast estimates for the remaining two quarters of 2011 as well as the four quarters of 2012 and full year:Source: Cowan LRA model.

The key take-aways from comparing the latest forecast results versus previous month's forecast numbers (in the above table) are highlighted below:
* 2011's updated global semicon sales forecast estimate fell marginally by $0.146 billion to $313.217 billion (from last month's sales forecast estimate of $313.363).
* Correspondingly, 2011's sales growth forecast estimate dropped by 0.049 percentage points to 4.995 percent (from last month's 5.044 percent sales growth forecast estimate).
* August 2011's actual sales forecast expectation is $26.177 billion, which corresponds to an August 3MMA sales estimate of $25.686 billion assuming no (or very minor) sales revisions to either June or July's published actual sales compared to July's just published HBR by the WSTS.
* 2012's global semicon sales forecast estimate fell by $4.270 billion to $339.443 billion (from last month's sales forecast estimate of $343.713).