Shares of SK hynix tumbled 5.9% to ₩2,084,000 on June 10 after a week that compressed months of drama into five trading days — a spike on blockbuster AI-memory news, a market-wide crash, and now a grinding reassessment of how much of the good news is already priced in. SK hynix Cements Its Place as NVIDIA's Memory Backbone — but After an 825% Rally and a Market Meltdown, Is the Easy Money Gone?
Shares of SK hynix slid 5.9% to ₩2,084,000 on June 10, extending a week of extreme volatility that saw the stock whipsaw between an AI-fueled euphoria high and a market-wide crash. On June 7, NVIDIA and SK hynix announced a multiyear technology partnership for next-generation memory aligned to NVIDIA's AI infrastructure roadmap — but the deal landed just days after the KOSPI plunged 8.37%, triggering a 20-minute circuit breaker, with Samsung and SK hynix both falling 10% intraday . Investors are now asking whether fundamentals justify the price or whether the AI trade has run too far, too fast.
A Landmark Deal That Locks In Revenue Visibility for Years
The agreement addresses extended development cycles and capital investments for AI factories, with SK hynix diversifying into new NVIDIA markets spanning AI infrastructure, personal AI, and physical AI . For shareholders, this is a guaranteed seat at the table: UBS predicts SK hynix will achieve roughly 70% market share in HBM4 memory for NVIDIA's next-generation platform in 2026 . That kind of lock-in is rare in the notoriously cyclical memory business.
Record Profits Underpin the Bull Case — for Now
In Q1 2026, SK hynix posted ₩52.58 trillion in revenue, up 198% year-over-year, with an operating margin above 70% . Over the past twelve months, the stock has skyrocketed 825% . But those margins depend on pricing power that competitors are chasing: if Samsung achieves mass production of HBM4 in late 2026, SK hynix's market share could slide to 50–60% , compressing the premium it currently commands.
The Selloff Was Mechanical, Not Fundamental — and That's Its Own Risk
Foreign sellers offloaded about $62 billion of South Korean stocks through late May, and experts say the selling has less to do with deteriorating fundamentals than the market's own success . Retail margin debt stood at ₩37.74 trillion as of June 4, leaving leveraged accounts vulnerable to margin calls and forced selling . When positioning — not earnings — drives the tape, even good news like the NVIDIA deal can't stop the bleeding.
The Real Question Is Valuation, Not Strategy
Based on annualized Q1 profit, SK hynix trades at roughly 8.4x earnings; using full-year broker forecasts, the forward multiple drops to about 6.5x — cheap for a company growing revenue at triple digits, but the math changes fast if memory prices cool. The next catalyst arrives Wednesday with the U.S. May CPI report: a softer inflation print would ease pressure on AI valuations, while a hawkish surprise would test whether Korea's correction is truly over .