SAN JOSE — The 90-day moving average orders at North America-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers fell 26.3% year-over-year in November, dashing hopes for a near-term turnaround.
Manufacturers posted $720.4 million in orders in November, down 3% from the revised October level and 26.3% lower than November 2011, SEMI said.
The three-month average of worldwide billings was $911.9 million, down 7.5% from the updated October level and down 22.5% from a year ago. November equipment billings are at a three-year low, SEMI said.
The book-to-bill ratio was 0.79, meaning that $79 worth of orders were received for every $100 of product billed for the month. A ratio of 1.0 is considered a sign of near-term market gains.
The SEMI book-to-bill is a ratio of three-month moving averages of worldwide bookings and billings for North American-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers. Billings and bookings figures are in millions of US dollars.
| 
 
  | 
 Billings  | 
 Bookings  | 
 Book-to-Bill  | 
| 
 June 2012  | 
 1,535.7  | 
 1,424.3  | 
 0.93  | 
| 
 July 2012  | 
 1,442.8  | 
 1,234.6  | 
 0.86  | 
| 
 August 2012  | 
 1,331.5  | 
 1,092.9  | 
 0.82  | 
| 
 September 2012 (final)  | 
 1,164.4  | 
 912.8  | 
 0.78  | 
| 
 October 2012 (revised)  | 
 985.5  | 
 742.8  | 
 0.75  | 
| 
 November 2012 (prelim)  | 
 911.9  | 
 720.4  | 
 0.79  | 
Source: SEMI, December 2012