SEOUL -- Earnings released Tuesday by Samsung Electronics show weakness in all of its mainstay businesses, a concerning development for a trade-reliant South Korean economy that counts on the company's exports.
Operating profit for the three months through March plunged 60% on the year to 6.23 trillion won ($5.37 billion), the lowest since the July-September quarter of 2016. But while there was a single clear reason for the earlier drop-off -- namely, the battery fires in Samsung's flagship Galaxy Note 7 smartphone -- last quarter's results owed to broader problems.
