KB Securities forecasted on the 25th that SK hynix is expected to achieve differentiated performance compared to competitors in the high-bandwidth memory (HBM) sector. It maintained its investment recommendation of 'Buy' and raised its target price from 280,000 won to 340,000 won. The closing price for SK hynix on the previous transaction day was 278,500 won.
Kim Dong-won, a researcher at KB Securities, said, "With the full-scale shipment of HBM3E 12-layer products, the product mix is expected to improve, and the profitability of high-end DRAM will continue to improve." He noted, "It is expected to strengthen its dominance in HBM4, where a double-digit average selling price (ASP) increase is possible, creating differentiated results from competitors."
KB Securities predicted that for general-purpose memory, as wafer input is reduced due to production cuts and the transition to front-end processes, the price of general-purpose memory will stabilize in the second half of the year. It also raised the operating profit forecasts for this year and next year to 38.4 trillion won and 45.1 trillion won, respectively.
Researcher Kim said, "In particular, the sales proportion of HBM in the DRAM sector is expected to be 47% this year, which will reduce performance volatility and enable stable performance creation." He added, "Although there exists some demand uncertainty in the second half of the year due to potential tariff imposition on items in the semiconductor sector and concentrated pre-purchases of memory semiconductors in the first half, SK hynix is expected to demonstrate a competitiveness gap through performance differentiation."