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STORY: Samsung Electronics posted its strongest second-quarter profits since 2018, despite a weakened demand for smartphones and rising inflation.

Samsung's earnings were bolstered by a strong demand for memory chips from server clients like Amazon.

The South Korean company is the world's largest smartphone and memory-chip maker.

Its revenue rose by more than 20%, in line with estimates.

The Q2 jump was in spite of several headwinds.

Analysts say rising inflation, the war in Ukraine and China's lockdowns have slowed smartphone sales.

Meanwhile other chipmakers had warned of a looming chip glut, owing to server customers who had already stocked up as the number of people working from home increased.

Others had also signaled a waning demand as inflation squeezes spending.

But analysts say large U.S. tech firms with a lot of data center services like Microsoft, Google and Meta kept buying chips to meet cloud demand.

And, they say strong sales from those clients shielded Samsung's profits.

They may have also been helped by a strong U.S. dollar, which hit a 20-year high.

While the company reports its profit in Korean won, its chip sales are made mainly in U.S. dollars.

So a firm greenback means higher earnings of chips.