SK Hynix Clears Hanmi Supply Snag, Wins $28.6 Billion Buyback as AI Memory Demand Swells
Published on 09/19/2026 at 17:10 | Editorial boerse-global.de
SK Hynix closed out a turbulent stretch with two pieces of good news in hand: a resolution to a month-long standoff with its key equipment supplier and boardroom approval for the largest share cancellation ever undertaken by a listed South Korean company.
The chipmaker's shares finished Friday at 1,839,000.00 KRW, up 5.4% on the day, as word spread that Hanmi Semiconductor would resume shipments and send service engineers back to SK Hynix's Icheon fab. The dispute had threatened to disrupt output of high-bandwidth memory (HBM), the advanced stacked chips that SK Hynix supplies chiefly to Nvidia.
A Supply Chain Breathing Again
Hanmi accounts for more than 90% of the TC bonders SK Hynix relies on to assemble modern HBM stacks, making the vendor effectively irreplaceable in the near term. The relationship cuts both ways: Hanmi draws over half its revenue from SK Hynix, while roughly 30% of SK Hynix's own sales are tied to HBM modules shipped to Nvidia.
With order books across the semiconductor industry already stretched, a prolonged halt to equipment maintenance could have put contractual GPU delivery deadlines at risk. The truce removes that immediate operational hazard from the procurement chain.
Wall Street Warms, Seoul Rewards Shareholders
Bank of America analyst Simon Woo raised his price target on the stock from $250 to $268 on Monday, keeping a buy rating. The endorsement lands as the equity has climbed 186% since the start of the year, a run that reflects SK Hynix's grip on AI memory supply.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying SK Hynix?
Management added its own vote of confidence on August 19, when the board signed off on a program to repurchase and fully retire 40 trillion won worth of stock — about $28.6 billion. By the company's own account, no listed South Korean firm has ever cancelled that many of its own shares. Between 2025 and 2027, SK Hynix also intends to return more than half of cumulative free cash flow to investors through buybacks, cancellations and cash dividends. Third-quarter results are due October 27.
Demand Forecasts Keep Climbing
Broader market projections reinforce the bullish case. The volume of memory required is expected to swell to 2.8 times 2026 levels by 2028, and Citi anticipates supply shortages persisting through 2031.
Fears that AI development is losing steam are only partly shared among industry watchers. Kim Un-ho of IBK Investment & Securities points out that the growing deployment of autonomous AI agents creates an independent source of demand for dynamic random-access memory, which should keep investment in computing power flowing steadily. SK Hynix used the AI Infrastructure Summit to unveil new memory architectures including PIM, SALT-KV and HBF.
Three Paths to American Soil
Operational relief is being matched by exploratory moves to broaden the company's manufacturing footprint. Reuters reported Wednesday that SK Hynix and Intel are in talks about producing memory chips on U.S. soil for the first time, with options including leasing part of Intel's planned Ohio fab or forming a joint venture with Intel and major cloud providers seeking long-term supply allocations.
SK Hynix told Reuters it is weighing various options to strengthen the competitiveness of its memory business, including additional production sites, but stressed that nothing has been firmly decided. Separately, U.S. subsidiary Solidigm is considering building its own NAND flash plant, with New York state seen as the front-runner; Solidigm currently makes NAND exclusively at its Dalian site in China.
One more data point underscored the tightening backdrop: DRAM inventories across the market fell below ten days on Thursday, the lowest level since 2021.
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