Troubled Samsung Electronics has today slashed its quarterly profit estimate by a third.
The move came as it soaked up a $2.3 billion hit from ditching its flagship smartphone in what could be one of the costliest product safety failures in tech history.
Quantifying the financial pain of the move to scrap the Galaxy Note 7 after a global recall and weeks of mounting problems, the world's top smartphone maker said it expects its July-September operating profit was 5.2 trillion won ($4.7 billion).
This is down from the 7.8 trillion won it estimated five days ago.
Samsung said the 2.6 trillion won ($2.3 billion) guidance cut reflects the sales and earning impact it currently expects from the decision to permanently halt sales of the $882 Note 7 device.
Its third-quarter revenue estimate was also cut to 47 trillion won from 49 trillion won previously.
The new earnings guidance is 30% below third-quarter 2015's operating profit, and left investors and analysts pondering the longer impact on Samsung's brand and earnings.
Rival suppliers of smartphones that use the Android operating system, like Samsung's, stand to benefit if the Note 7 damage drive consumers elsewhere.
Samsung shares have already fallen 10% this week and are on track for their biggest weekly decline since May 2012.
They had touched a one-month low of 1.494 million won as investors worried the Note 7 crisis could inflict long-term damage on Samsung's reputation and earnings.
Some investors said Samsung may need to return more cash to shareholders, either through a dividend or additional buybacks, to calm market jitters.
Analysts said the cash-rich firm may need to announce a buyback of between 2 trillion won and 3 trillion won in order to mollify shareholders whose nerves have been jangled.
The tech giant announced the recall of 2.5 million Note 7s in early September following reports of the phones catching fire.
The firm appeared to have the situation under control as it issued replacement devices with different batteries, until new phones also began to smoke and combust.
Investors and analysts agreed that the damage to Samsung's brand and future earnings would deepen the longer the market was left in the dark about the origin of the fault.
Some have already predicted lost revenue in the region of $17 billion for Samsung.
Samsung would likely push ahead to get the latest version of its premium S-series smartphones to market as soon as possible, experts said.
Typically, the South Korean company unveils a new Galaxy S phone on the sidelines of the Mobile World Congress tech trade show in the first quarter as it battles Apple to stay at the top of the smartphone market.
Experts are baffled by what could be causing the overheating in the replacement phones, if not the batteries, and Samsung has not commented.
An official at the Korean Agency for Technology and Standards, which is investigating the problem alongside Samsung, said the fault in the replacement devices might not be the same as the problem in the original product.
The official asked not to be identified as he was not authorised to speak publicly.
Aviation authorities and airlines around the world are telling passengers to switch off their Note 7s and keep them out of checked baggage, amid fears they could bring down a plane.
While the damage to Samsung's brand, if not its earnings, remains hard to quantify, negative publicity from the botched recall could touch off a turf war among Android smartphone manufacturers, analysts said.
Consumers tend to commit to their choice between Apple's iOS operating system and Google's Android, leaving Samsung's fellow Android manufacturers such as LG Electronics and Alphabet's Google in prime position to strike.
