#每周来晒 SK hynix: The Most Undervalued "Money Printer" in the AI Era? Why Is It the Most Attractive of the Three-Way Battle

The memory chip business has been the "king of cycles" for decades—soaring when prices rise and causing despair when they fall. But the landscape has changed in 2026: AI has turned DRAM and HBM into a golden track for "shovel sellers," and SK hynix is the player selling the shovels at the highest price, with the lowest costs, while still being the cheapest.

I. Industry Dynamics: From a "Cyclical Roller Coaster" to a "Long, Slow Bull Market"
Traditional memory is highly cyclical: oversupply → prices collapse → capacity is eliminated → undersupply → prices surge, repeating over and over.
But AI has rewritten everything: HBM (high-bandwidth memory) is an essential "organ" for AI chips. A single NVIDIA GPU needs to be paired with several HBM stacks, and each generational upgrade only increases demand.
Goldman Sachs estimates that the memory shortage will continue through 2028.
The industry view is even more blunt: HBM capacity for 2027 is already sold out. Those asking about 2027 supply now will have to queue for 2028.
HBM demand has increased 2.5x, but yields are only 60%—this is not an ordinary inventory cycle, but a structural supply-demand mismatch.
> In one sentence: It used to be "no business for three years, then eat for three years"; now it is "business every year, meat every day."

II. Supply and Demand: Undersupply Is Already Clear

Undersupply is not a forecast; it is already a reality, and long-term contracts have "welded" it in place.

III. Three-Way Battle: Who Is the True King

SK hynix's moat: HBM4 is already in mass production and shipping, with capacity expansion planned for the second half of the year; HBM4E samples have already been delivered.
Operating margin: 76%; net profit margin: 118% (yes, you read that correctly—net profit being higher than revenue is due to investment income and tax factors, but the profitability of the core business is also absurdly strong). We can focus on 76%, which is 1% higher than NVIDIA's figure we just analyzed.
Net cash of 69.4 trillion won, with financial strength fully maxed out.
South Korea's largest-ever $29 billion buyback provides a floor.
Micron's characteristics: Its results are equally spectacular (quarterly EPS of $25 and record-high free cash flow), but US stocks have given it a 21x PE, and its market cap has already exceeded $1 trillion—the rise is driven by expectations, while the premium comes from sentiment.
Samsung's awkward position: It is the largest by scale, but its HBM certification was previously held up by NVIDIA and its progress lags behind. In this "AI memory feast," it looks like someone holding a golden bowl while begging for food.

IV. Valuation: SK hynix Is Almost Absurdly Cheap
Both sell HBM: Micron's PE is around 21x, with a forward PE of around 15x, while SK hynix's forward PE is only 5–6x
They are both core AI computing-power plays, yet their valuations differ by 3x. The reasons are essentially:
1. Liquidity discount in the South Korean market + geopolitical (Korean Peninsula) risk premium
2. Korean won exchange-rate volatility
3. The market's instinctive wariness toward "cyclical stocks"
But the question is—when all HBM capacity has been sold through 2028, is this still a "cyclical stock"? If it is repriced as a growth stock, a forward PE of 5–6x is practically giving money away.

V. Buy/Sell Recommendations:
Already holding (hold) ✅
> The supercycle is not over; undersupply should last at least through 2028, while the valuation is still on the floor. With HBM4 in mass production, a $29 billion buyback, and net cash support, hold on and don't get itchy fingers. The endpoint for a cyclical stock is never "expensive," but a "supply-demand reversal."
Want to buy (buy in tranches) ✅
> SK hynix offers the best value among the three. It is 3x cheaper than Micron and offers more technological certainty than Samsung. It is recommended to build a position in tranches on pullbacks rather than going all in at once—after all, it comes from a cyclical background and has a temper deep in its bones.
Want to sell (wait for signals)
Consider reducing your position only after any of the following signals appears:
1. HBM supply-demand reversal (prices soften and fewer LTA orders are locked in)
2. Market share erosion (Micron/Samsung achieve certification breakthroughs and SK hynix's HBM share falls below 45%)
3. Valuation recovery is complete (forward PE returns to 12–15x, indicating that the market has priced it as a growth stock and excess returns have disappeared)

As long as NVIDIA keeps counting money, SK hynix's shovel will remain scorching hot. $SK Hynix