--- title: "Korea" canonical: "https://anchor.is/the-hysteresis/issue/7/korea" publication: "The Hysteresis" publisher: "The Hysteresis" language: "en-US" guide: "https://anchor.is/the-hysteresis/llms.txt" permalink: "https://anchor.is/the-hysteresis/issue/7/korea" issue: 7 section: "korea" description: "LG, Samsung, SK — beyond the headlines" authors: ["Elise Huan-Cartwright"] published: 2026-07-27 updated: 2026-07-25 articles: 14 --- # The Hysteresis > The Hysteresis exists to give a small cross-functional team — strategy, investment, and procurement — a shared weekly instrument for reading the battery supply chain earlier than consensus. Success means the team consistently identifies inflection points in cell pricing, supplier health, and policy enforcement weeks or months before they surface in earnings calls, annual surveys, or trade press. The commercial mechanism is internal-first: the publication proves itself as a decision tool inside the organization, then extends to paid subscribers and a practitioner community as upside. Revenue follows utility — if the team makes better-timed procurement calls and competitive assessments because of what they read here, the publication earned its place. [Read on the website]() ## Issue 7 — Korea LG, Samsung, SK — beyond the headlines ### Pre-Earnings Dashboard All three Korean battery makers report Q2 results on July 30, within six hours of each other. These six cards set the pre-earnings baseline: what preliminary filings and Q1 decks already tell us, where disclosure gaps remain, and what to listen for when the full presentations land. Two of three companies show narrowing underlying losses. Credit disclosure remains uneven: LGES publishes the number, Samsung SDI buried it in a KRX filing, SK On disclosed nothing. Utilization rates are stale, stuck at 2025 annual figures with no quarterly refresh from any maker. Meanwhile, the Chinese ESS price floor that Korean routes compete against held flat for a fourth straight week even as lithium carbonate dropped 7.2%. July 30 is the next real data event. - **LGES Ex-Credit Loss Narrows, Still Negative** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: LGES Preliminary Covered in the prior issue; brief update only. Q2 preliminary: KRW 113.3B reported operating profit, KRW 241.0B IRA credit contribution, implying a KRW -127.7B ex-credit operating loss (LG Energy Solution IR release). That loss narrowed substantially from approximately KRW -397.5B in Q1. Reported profit turned positive solely because the credit exceeded the underlying shortfall. Full decomposition holds for the July 30 final release. - **Samsung SDI's KRX Filing Surfaces AMPC Figure** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: Samsung SDI Q1 battery-segment revenue KRW 3.35T, operating loss KRW -176.6B (Samsung SDI Q1 2026 earnings release). The English IR deck omitted any 45X breakout. The KRX preliminary filing, however, disclosed KRW 80.5B in consolidated AMPC. See the companion feature for the full subsidized-economics decomposition; this card is status only. - **SK On Loss Narrows, Credit Disclosure Still Absent** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: SK On Q1 revenue KRW 1.79T, operating loss KRW -349.2B, improved from KRW -440.8B in Q4 (SK Innovation Q1 2026 consolidated earnings). Europe and Asia volume recovery partially offset softer North American shipments. No 45X or AMPC figure appeared in reviewed filings. The GRIDON ESS roadmap carries no named customer and no delivery evidence to date. - **July 30: All Three Report the Same Day** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: Earnings Schedule LGES at 10:00 KST, Samsung SDI at 14:00, SK Innovation at 16:00 (KRX IR schedule filings). Six hours, three calls. This is the next hard data drop for Q2 utilization direction, ASP trajectory, EV versus ESS revenue mix, and facility-level production detail. None of these signals are publicly available before that date. - **Lithium Fell, Chinese ESS Cell Prices Didn't** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: China Floor InfoLink assessment, July 22: lithium carbonate dropped 7.2% WoW to roughly RMB 141K/MT, yet LFP ESS cells held at RMB 0.370/Wh and DC containers at RMB 0.50/Wh. Fourth consecutive week of cell-lithium divergence. The competitive floor Korean ESS routes price against did not budge. - **No Fresh Utilization Data From Any Korean Maker** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Tag: Utilization Gap No Q1 or Q2 2026 utilization rate was disclosed by any of the three companies in reviewed filings. Standing baselines are 2025 annual figures: LGES 47.6%, Samsung SDI approximately 50%, SK On 48.7%. Presenting these as current would be misleading. July 30 calls are the next opportunity for a refresh. ### Samsung SDI Decomposition - [Samsung SDI Q1 2026: Ex-Credit Losses Narrowed, but the Battery Segment Bridge Stays Blank]() — By [Elise Huan-Cartwright]() · Published 2026-07-24 · Format: The Earnings Decomposition Samsung SDI's consolidated ex-credit operating loss narrowed to KRW -236.1B in Q1 2026, improving KRW 374.7B from the Q3 2025 trough on essentially flat AMPC. The improvement is operational, not credit-driven. But the KRW 80.5B in disclosed production incentives sits at the consolidated level. Samsung does not allocate it to the battery segment, which means the segment-level credit bridge that LGES now provides quarter by quarter remains a blank row. Direction is improving. Legibility of that improvement has not kept pace. ### Contract vs. Press Release - [The Samsung SDI–L&F cathode deal reads differently in KRX than in the press release]() — By [Elise Huan-Cartwright]() · Published 2026-07-24 Samsung SDI's [March 2026 announcement](https://www.samsungsdi.com/sdi-now/sdi-news/4822.html) frames the L&F agreement as a "mid- to long-term LFP cathode supply deal" worth "approximately KRW 1.6 trillion over three years starting next year." The pricing mechanism, volume flexibility, and conditionality are all absent. Read cold, it sounds like locked supply for StarPlus ESS production. ### Samsung SDI Source File - **Samsung SDI Q1 2026 Earnings Release (English)** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Battery-segment KRW 3.35T revenue and KRW -176.6B operating loss; credits AMPC for the sequential improvement but does not quantify the credit, which is the gap the KRX filing fills. - **KRX Samsung SDI Q1 2026 Preliminary Consolidated Results** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Contains the KRW 80.5B AMPC/45X figure absent from the English deck, making it the primary source for the ex-credit operating loss derivation (KRW -257.1B) central to this issue's 45X decomposition. - **Samsung SDI Announces L&F LFP Cathode Supply Deal** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 The press-release version of the KRW 1.6T cathode deal: StarPlus Indiana delivery, Q4 2026 LFP mass-production target, and PFE-compliance framing worth reading against the contractual fine print in the L&F KRX filing below. - **L&F KRX Contract Filing for Samsung SDI LFP Cathode Supply** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 The contractual terms the press release omits: ±25% annual volume variance, raw-material price linkage, and a supply-suspension clause triggered by pricing disputes, all of which qualify the headline commitment significantly. - **Samsung SDI Wins KRW 1.5 Trillion U.S. ESS Prismatic Battery Deal** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 NCA-to-LFP phased supply through StarPlus (2026–2029) with an unnamed U.S. energy counterparty and no GWh volume disclosed, making independent verification of implied ASP and capacity commitment impossible from this source alone. - **Samsung SDI Q2 2026 IR Schedule Disclosure** — [Source]() — Published 2026-07-24 Confirms the July 30 earnings call at 14:00 KST with simultaneous English webcast; no Q2 financials are available before that date, which bounds what this issue can and cannot assess. ## Other sections in Issue 7 - [Signal]() - [China]() - [The Log]() - [Defense]() - [Qualification]() ## More - [Publication guide]() - [Issue archive]()