chipequipment maker asml holding on wednesday boosted its sales guidance for the year as the company awaits the latest us decision that could restrict sales to china the dutch microchip equipment maker said its earnings rose to €194 billion 22 billion or €493 per share from €141 billion or €354 per share sales climbed to €69 billion from €543 billion after selling 113 lithography systems the eps figure beat expectations by 8 and topped revenue estimates by 3 according to bank of america asml ceo peter wennick said the company sold more immersion systems than anticipated and that it began to recognize socalled fast shipments in the second quarter which means the company books revenue when the machine comes out of the factory in the netherlands rather than when it’s installed at the customer’s site asml disclosed that 24 of its shipments in the second quarter were to china where it’s restricted from selling its most advanced systems “our chinese customers say ‘we are happy to take the machines that others don’t want’ because their fabs are ready” he said in a video interview released by the company wennick said new dutch restrictions on sales to china of deep ultraviolet lithography systems which go into effect in september were close to what the company anticipated “the japanese government has come out with their ruling end of may the dutch government a few weeks ago so we’re waiting for the american rules to come out there have been some media reports that the americans are contemplating some additional measures of course that is speculative we don’t know what it is but what we understand it will not have a major impact on what we said before” he said outside of china wennick said end markets seem to be bottoming out but chipmakers are still dealing with high inventories in turn that means companies will reduce wafer output and utilize asml’s tools less he also talked about a lack of skills “whether it is in taiwan or in the us there are skills issues people who actually have the capability to build these very advanced fabs” wennick said asml says it’s expecting sales growth toward 30 rather than its previous guidance of more than 25 and a slight improvement in gross margins for the year jpmorgan analyst sandeep deshpande said the improved guidance is because of revenue recognition and china “meaning the market is unlikely to get very excited about it china is of course an important customer but current investor perception is that china semi companies are buying because of fear of further us restrictions and not because of demand driven by end market need” asml’s dutch listed shares asml asml rose 1 the stock has gained 33 this year