SK hynix shares rose sharply in intraday trading after the company posted a surprise first-quarter profit on surging demand tied to artificial intelligence chips.
According to the Korea Exchange, SK hynix was trading at 1.26 million won as of 9:44 a.m. Thursday, up 3.03% from the previous session. Earlier, it climbed 3.6% to 1.267 million won, setting a fresh record high.
The move followed an earnings beat. SK hynix said its first-quarter operating profit on a consolidated basis totaled 37.6103 trillion won, up 405% from a year earlier. Revenue rose 198% to 52.5763 trillion won, well above market expectations. FnGuide’s consensus had projected revenue of 50.1046 trillion won and operating profit of 34.8753 trillion won.
The company also surpassed its previous quarterly records set in the fourth quarter of last year, when it posted revenue of 32.8270 trillion won and operating profit of 19.1700 trillion won. Its operating margin reached 72%, up from 58% the prior quarter, marking a record high.
The results were driven mainly by a surge in demand for high-bandwidth memory, or HBM, as investment in AI servers expanded. Some analysts said the broader memory chip market is entering a “supercycle” as global big tech companies increase data center spending.
Samsung Electronics, another major player in semiconductors, earlier reported preliminary first-quarter results of 133 trillion won in revenue and 57.2 trillion won in operating profit, underscoring strong conditions across South Korea’s chip sector. Samsung shares also touched a record high of 228,000 won early Thursday.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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