Hynix Semiconductor Inc., the world's second-largest maker of computer memory chips, said Thursday that it swung to the red in the fourth quarter as memory chip prices fell on slowing demand for computers.

Net loss amounted to 239.9 billion won (US$213.1 million) in the October-December period, a turnaround from a net profit of 30 billion won a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing. The fourth-quarter reading marked the second consecutive quarterly net loss.

The result was worse than a median forecast of a 145.2 billion won net loss in a poll surveyed by Yonhap Infomax, the financial news arm of Yonhap News Agency.

Sales inched down 7.2 percent on-year to 2.55 trillion won in the fourth quarter while the company posted an operating loss of 167.5 billion won.

For 2011, its net loss reached 56 billion won, compared with a net profit of 2.6 trillion won the previous year. Sales declined

14.1 percent on-year to 10.4 trillion won and operating profit tumbled 89.1 percent to 325.5 billion won.

"Last year, global economic uncertainty and natural disasters in Japan and Thailand undercut demand for tech products," the company said in a statement.

Hynix vies with bigger rival Samsung Electronics Co. in the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip market and with Japan-based Toshiba Corp. in the NAND flash memory market.

The prices of DRAM chips, which are used in personal computers, had suffered from sustained falls since September 2010. Damage wrought by flooding in Thailand, the world's leading maker of computer drives, weighed on global computer markets.

According to the company, the average DRAM price fell 19 percent in the fourth quarter and prices of NAND flash shed 17 percent.

The company said it will invest a combined 4.2 trillion won on facility investment this year, up around 20 percent from the previous year. It plans to pour 3.4 trillion won into developments of chips and the remainder will be used for other capital spending.

On Jan. 26, the board of Hynix Semiconductor decided to allow its current chief executive officer Kwon Oh-chul to continue to head the chipmaker, despite a recent deal to sell a major stake to SK Telecom Co., the country's top mobile carrier. (Yonhap News)