The firm reported sales of NT$244.683 billion for December, representing a 5.56% growth from November or 83.8% from a year earlier, and a single-quarter high of NT$719.372 billion for the fourth quarter, 11.2% more than the third quarter.

Institutional investors pointed out that the firm's banner December revenue was attributable to its strong shipments of 3C products, including Apple's iPad and iPhone, both of which have emerged as two of world's hottest-sellers in the past year.

Although succeeding in attaining his revenue growth goal of 30% set for 2010, Hon Hai's chairman Terry Gou appears conservative about the firm's outlook for 2011, reflected in his reduction of the 2011 growth projection to only 15% from 30% for each of the past few years, worrying investors for a while.

But, Gou explained that the 15% growth is the minimum, which will be achieved for sure, and stressed that, from another perspective, the projection cut also makes sense, as the firm will probably see a growth slowdown in the coming years after several years of very rapid growth.

Institutional investors, however, are comparatively optimistic about the firm's revenue in the first quarter of 2011, partly due to the firm being the exclusive supplier to Apple, and partly the launch of Microsoft's controller-free gaming device Kinect.