Micron Technology stock was gaining early on Wednesday. There was good news about future memory prices from SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
Micron shares were up 2% in early trading. That comes after a 7.6% gain the previous day.
The shares have gained more than 700% in the past 12 months as the growth of artificial-intelligence technology has intensified demand for memory components.
And while Micron and South Korean rivals SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics are rushing to increase production capacity, Musk sees no short-term slowdown.
“The memory output is increasing by around 20% per year. Now, normally, that would be fantastically fast and amazing for any large mature industry, but ask yourself. Is the demand increasing by 20% a year? No, the demand is increasing by 200% a year, maybe higher,” Musk said in a SpaceX earnings call late on Tuesday.
That’s good news for Micron and SK Hynix. The latter’s American depositary receipts were down 2.9% in the premarket but J.P. Morgan analysts reiterated an Overweight rating on SK Hynix’s South Korean stock in a research note Wednesday.
“Memory sector and stock narrative is moving away from earnings per share growth and momentum to the duration of the cycle. Clear stance on capital allocation is imperative, in our view, to restore stock sentiment after a 46% pullback from the recent peak in June,” J.P. Morgan analyst Jay Kwon wrote.
Kwon argued SK Hynix could announce a share buyback in the next few months and it would act as a “key catalyst” for the stock as he lowered his target price to 2.75 million won ($1,929.61) from 3 million won. SK Hynix’s shares closed up 5.8% at 1.67 million won in South Korea on Wednesday.
Barron’s has written positively about SK Hynix’s ADRs, suggesting they offer a cheaper way to play the memory-chip boom than Micron.
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