A 14.2% slump in sales of chips to the US market in April was accompanied by small rise in orders, so that the Semiconductor Industry Association’s book-to-bill ratio came out unchanges at 1.09. At $1,114.0m, April shipments were 14.2% down on the March figure and 10.5% down on the figure a year ago. Average monthly orders for the three months to April totaled $1,279.3m, 1.0% up on the three-month average figure to March, and three-month average orders to April were $1,172m to produce the 1.09 figure; the February ratio has been revised upwards to 1.07 from the reported 1.05. Over the past 13 months, the ratio, which stood at 1.03 for April 1988, fell to 1.00 in May, dipping below parity for June, July and August and hitting a low of 0.88 in September before recovering in October and November to make it back over parity at 1.01 for December, and going up to 1.06 this January.
