Earnings season is underway. SK Hynix reported Q1 2026 today and told us memory demand still sits well above available supply: ₩52.6T revenue 72% operating margin DRAM ASP up mid-60% QoQ NAND ASP up mid-70% QoQ
Customer demand over the NEXT 3 YEARS already exceeds SK Hynix’s supply capacity by a significant margin. Management explicitly pointed to key equipment procurement, including EUV, as a major capex driver, with long lead times still relevant.
Yongin Phase 1 was pulled forward by 3 months to February 2027, but there are still no new fabs planned outside Yongin. In other words, capacity is moving forward, but not fast enough to erase the imbalance.
There was also an important nuance in NAND: ASP surged while shipments fell about 10% QoQ. That is a pricing power signal under constrained supply, not volume-led growth.
On spot pricing, SK Hynix was clear that recent weakness reflects channel inventory coming into market after the run-up, not an end-demand rollover.
The real bear case to watch is whether inference shifts toward lower-HBM architectures over time. SK Hynix’s view is that those systems hit their own limits and complex workloads still flow back toward HBM-GPU setups. That makes upcoming hyperscaler capex commentary on inference hardware mix especially important.
What I’m watching next: - LTA confirmation in Q2 or Q3 - ADR SEC review progress - May spot price direction