SK Hynix record profit powers chip shares higher
South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix reported record third-quarter results on Wednesday, giving fresh momentum to shares across Asia's semiconductor sector. Revenue surged 327.9% from a year earlier to 104.6 trillion won, while operating profit rose 632.1% to 83.3 trillion won, beating market expectations of around 76 trillion won. The company said demand for memory used in artificial intelligence infrastructure, above all high-bandwidth memory, continued to drive the business, with D-RAM and high-bandwidth memory volumes effectively sold out through 2029.
A broad chip rally
The earnings were paired with a shareholder-return plan worth about 100 trillion won for 2026, roughly $75 billion, combining cash dividends with share repurchases and cancellations. That includes a newly decided 20 trillion won treasury-share purchase, half earmarked for cancellation and half for employee compensation, alongside returns already completed earlier in October. SK Hynix also said it had signed long-term supply agreements with 14 major customers, covering more than half of its total capacity in both 2027 and 2028, and that it expects memory demand to exceed supply through 2030.
Caution beneath the celebration
SK Hynix shares closed up 10.89% on the session, and Samsung Electronics gained 9.01% in sympathy. South Korea's KOSPI index closed at 6,012.44 points, up 374.10 points or 6.63%, after touching 6,032 intraday and triggering a buy-side sidecar for a second straight session. Japan's Kioxia also jumped by more than 12% at one point, underlining how far the enthusiasm for memory makers travelled beyond Seoul.
The rally does not remove the questions hanging over the sector. Analysts noted that the Federal Reserve's rate decision, still pending at the time of writing, and the durability of foreign buying will help decide whether the gains hold. For now, though, SK Hynix has delivered the clearest evidence yet this earnings season that spending on AI infrastructure is still translating into very large profits for the companies supplying its memory.
