SK Hynix Stock Still Favored by Institutions After Volatility: HBM4 and Long-Term Supply Agreements Support AI-Era Growth

According to Korean media NATE, driven by the AI investment boom, SK Hynix's stock price has recently experienced severe volatility. Against the backdrop of intensifying market volatility, SK Group released an advertisement quoting the famous words of founder Choi Jong-geon (최종건): "Despair and hope are two sides of the same coin; despair can be turned into hope like flipping a hand," and rewrote it as "Anxiety and expectation in the AI era are also two sides of the same coin; anxiety can be turned into expectation," thereby conveying confidence in the long-term development of the AI industry. Securities firms believe that short-term stock price volatility has not changed SK Hynix's fundamentals, and the market should focus on its HBM4 technology leadership advantage and the performance stability brought by Long-Term Agreements (LTA). Hyundai Motor Securities analyst Noh Geun-chang (노근창) stated that SK Hynix's DRAM and NAND bit growth rates for the third quarter are expected to reach 9.7% and 1.5% respectively; with the expansion of HBM4 sales contribution, even if the proportion of Long-Term Agreements increases, DRAM Average Selling Price (ASP) is still expected to rise 19.9% quarter-over-quarter. Regarding competition concerns brought by China's ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), Noh Geun-chang believes that considering the US continues to strengthen semiconductor equipment export restrictions and Micron is expanding domestic investment in the US, the possibility of major companies like Apple adopting Chinese memory chips is relatively low.