SEOUL, Jan. 26 (Yonhap) -- SK hynix Inc., a global chipmaker, said Thursday its operating profit for the fourth quarter of last year jumped 55.3 percent on-year thanks to a steady recovery in memory chip prices.

The South Korean chipmaker said in a regulatory filing that it posted an operating profit of 1.53 trillion won (US$1.31 billion) for the October-December period of 2016.

The fourth-quarter operating profit marks the highest since the third quarter of 2015 when the comparable figure was 1.38 trillion won.

The result also beat market expectations. Local brokerage firms estimated SK hynix's operating income to have reached 1.3 trillion won in the fourth quarter of last year.

SK hynix has reported an operating income of below 1 trillion won since the July-September period of 2015 as it struggled with low chip prices and oversupply.

But its bottom line has started to improve since the second half of last year on the back of a recovery in the global chip market.

Sales also increased 21.3 percent on-year to a quarterly record-high of 5.3 trillion won in the fourth quarter of 2016.

"The company posted quarterly record-high sales due to favorable market conditions of strong demand and rising prices," SK hynix said.

For all of 2016, however, net profit fell 31.5 percent from a year earlier, to 2.96 trillion won, compared to 4.32 trillion won a year ago, with its sales falling 8.5 percent on-year to 17.19 trillion won last year. SK hynix posted an operating profit of 3.27 trillion won in 2016, down 38.6 percent from 5.33 trillion won in 2015.

The poor annual performance is attributable to its lowest quarterly profit in the April-July period of last year, due to falling demand for smartphones and computers which hit chip prices and sluggish shipment of major products.

However, SK hynix began enjoying robust operating profits on the back of favorable DRAM shipments during the fourth quarter of 2016

SK hynix said its DRAM shipment jumped by 13 percent on-year during the October-December period, and the prices also spiked 14 percent on-year.

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