Has the unprecedented semiconductor memory bubble arrived?

The price of DRAM memory for semiconductors continued to rise further. The spot-market transaction prices for benchmark products in 2025 November–December increased by 40% compared with the prices agreed in the previous round of negotiations in September. Global large companies are prioritizing deliveries of artificial intelligence (AI) servers for data centers, resulting in insufficient supply of benchmark products for people’s livelihood sectors such as personal computers (PCs). Demand-side buyers have difficulty securing the required quantities.

DRAM is installed in devices such as servers for data centers, PCs, and smartphones, for temporary storage of data. Spot-market transaction prices are determined through monthly or quarterly negotiations among memory makers as the sellers, device manufacturers as the buyers, and module makers.

Due to supply falling short of demand, a rare situation occurred in 2025 October where it was impossible to form spot-market transaction prices. Although prices were set for November–December, “we were unable to procure the quantities we wanted” (an executive at an electronics trading company). Others have also pointed out that DDR5 and its prior-generation product DDR3 increased by 40%–2 times and 2–4 times, respectively, in 2025 October–December compared with the previous quarter. A leader at another trading company said, “An unprecedented semiconductor memory bubble affecting not only benchmark products has already arrived.”

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