synopsis

The company noted that revenue and operating profit were the second highest after the previous quarter’s record numbers.

South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix, a major supplier to U.S. big tech firms including Nvidia (NVDA) and Apple (APPL), announced strong quarterly results fueled by artificial intelligence (AI) demand.

The Seoul-based company reported net income of 8.11 trillion won ($5.7 billion) for the first quarter of the fiscal year 2025, up 23% year over year (YoY) and 1% higher than in the previous quarter.

Operating profit jumped 158% YoY but declined 9% sequentially while operating margin expanded 23 percentage points YoY to 42%. 

The company noted that revenue and operating profit were the second highest after the previous quarter’s record numbers.

The chipmaker said the memory market ramped up faster due to rising AI and inventory accumulation demand. It also noted that it has responded to the strong demand by making available its high-value-added products, such as 12-layer HBM3E and DDR5.

HBM refers to high bandwidth memory chips designed for high-speed data transfer and reduced power consumption and are particularly used in high-performance computing and AI applications.

SK Hynix reported revenue of 17.64 trillion won, a 42% year-over-year increase but an 11% sequential drop.

The company is part of the semiconductor supply chain that offers dynamic random access memory chips (DRAM) and flash memory chips (NAND).

SK Hynix said it will continue strengthening collaboration with supply chain partners to meet customer needs despite fluctuating demand amid global uncertainties. 

Trump’s tariffs on its trading partners have created uncertainty regarding the demand outlook. South Korea faces a 25% levy on its exports in addition to a 10% baseline tariff, although the U.S. president has paused its implementation for now.  

SK Hynix expects sales of its 12-layer HBM3E to increase strongly and account for 50% of its total HBM3E revenue in the second quarter. 

The company has started supplying customers with LPCAMM2 high-performance memory modules for AI PCs. When demand ramps up, it also plans to supply SOCAMM, a low-power DRAM module for AI servers.

The Philadelphia Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) ended Wednesday’s session up 3.75% at $173.07 and rose about 1% in the after-hours session.

The SOXX, however, is down about 20% this year.

(Note: 1 Korean won = $0.0007)

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