Samsung quarterly profit leaps 50%

Samsung Electronics reported a 50 per cent jump in fourth-quarter profits on Tuesday despite the humiliating Galaxy Note 7 recall that hammered the reputation of the world's largest smartphone maker.

The South Korean tech giant took another blow when prosecutors began investigating its involvement in a corruption scandal that has seen the country's president impeached, and sought the arrest of the firm's de facto leader Lee Jae-Yong.

In a statement, the group's flagship subsidiary Samsung Electronics said it posted operating profits of 9.22 trillion won (USD7.9 billion) during the October to December period.

Earnings were "driven by the components businesses, mainly the memory business and the display panel segment", it said, with the stronger US dollar also boosting profits.

Revenues were largely unchanged at 53.3 trillion won for the three months, the South Korean tech giant said.

For the full year, the firm said in a statement, "Samsung achieved solid results despite the Note 7 discontinuation in the second half" –the only reference to the debacle that saw the company withdraw its much-publicised device. Operating profits for 2016 reached 29.2 trillion won, up 10.7 percent year-on-year, it said, even though revenues were almost flat at 201.9 trillion won, up 0.6 percent.