Key points
- Samsung set the payment rules for its new chip bonus
- The money arrives as Samsung shares, not cash
- Phone and appliance workers are getting far less
A Samsung Electronics (005930) memory chip worker earning a little over 80 million won ($60,000) a year could receive about 750 million won ($560,000) in bonuses before tax, according to the company's largest union. That estimate includes Samsung's existing profit-sharing bonus. It isn't a payout Samsung has confirmed.
The Samsung Group Supra-Enterprise Union (초기업노동조합) shared its calculations after Samsung announced the payment rules for its new chip bonus on October 7. The company will put 10.5 percent of the chip division's 2026 operating profit into the special bonus pool, with no upper limit.
Samsung plans to pay that special bonus entirely in shares, subject to shareholder approval in March. Payment is scheduled for late March or early April 2027, after the annual shareholders' meeting. The stock price on the payment day will determine how many shares each worker receives.
The size of the bonus depends heavily on where someone works. For employees on similar salaries, the union estimated about 530 million won ($396,000) in the chip division's shared teams and 240 million won ($179,000) in System LSI and foundry, its logic-chip businesses.
An annual salary of a little over 80 million won is typical for a first-year section chief, a mid-level management title, according to Maeil Business Newspaper.
Samsung will initially withhold 49.5 percent for tax
Samsung will initially withhold 49.5 percent of the special bonus for tax. That rate combines the top 45 percent income tax rate and local income tax, Yonhap reported. The special bonus counts as 2027 income. Withholding at the top rate is meant to cut the chance of an extra tax bill at year-end settlement.
The union expects some workers to get part of that back once their year-end tax settlement is done, the Korea Economic Daily reported.
After tax, insurance, and any donation, the rest of the special bonus comes as shares. Workers can sell a third of them right away. Another third can't be sold for a year, and the last third can't be sold for two years.
Workers can choose to give 0.2 to 1 percent of the bonus to charity, and Samsung will match each donation won for won.
The notice didn't say how Samsung would pay if shareholders don't approve the share payment, according to Chosun Biz.
The bonus will weigh on third-quarter profit
Samsung reports preliminary third-quarter results on October 8. Brokers expect operating profit of 105.4 trillion won ($78.7B), which would be another record, according to the Korea Economic Daily.
That would be nearly nine times the 12.17 trillion won ($9.1B) Samsung earned a year earlier, Reuters reported.
Samsung counts the bonus as a cost before it pays it. In the second quarter, it set aside about 15.4 trillion won ($11.5B) for the first half of the year. The newspaper estimated this quarter's charge at about 11.4 trillion won ($8.5B), based on chip profit of about 109 trillion won ($81.4B).
"The chip division's special bonus provision will be reflected and have some effect on profit, but third-quarter operating profit looks set to slightly beat lowered market expectations," said Kim Sun-woo (김선우), an analyst at Meritz Securities (메리츠증권). Samsung shares fell 1.29 percent on October 7, a day before the report, Yonhap reported.
Phone and appliance workers get far less
The new bonus covers only the chip division. In May, Samsung agreed to give phone and appliance workers a much smaller additional award, shares worth about 6 million won ($4,500) on top of their usual bonus, SisaIN reported. The chip workers' estimates above include their existing profit-sharing bonus.
Many of those workers moved to a different union. The Samsung Electronics Union Donghaeng (삼성전자노동조합 동행) grew from about 2,600 members in May to more than 30,000 by early September, nearly all from the phone and appliance side. Over the same stretch, the Supra-Enterprise Union fell from more than 76,000 members to about 53,000.
"Dissatisfaction with a bonus deal that left out the phone and appliance division led to large numbers joining the Donghaeng union," Baek Soon-an (백순안), the Donghaeng union's policy planning director, told SisaIN.
The union official's and analyst's comments are translated from Korean.
