As Samsung Electronics recovered to the "800,000 won range," executives who bought the company's shares a year ago also moved into a gain-on-paper zone.
According to the Financial Supervisory Service's Data Analysis, Retrieval and Transfer System (DART) on the 24th, Jun Young-hyun, head of the Device Solutions (DS) institutional sector (vice chairman) leading Samsung Electronics' semiconductor business, bought 5,000 shares of Samsung Electronics on the market last September at 62,700 won per share. It was three months after buying 5,000 shares at 75,200 won per share in June of the same year.
Excluding the 7,000 shares already held by Vice Chairman Jun, the average purchase price for 10,000 shares is 68,950 won. As of 10:20 a.m. that day, based on the Samsung Electronics share price (84,800 won), the paper gain rate stands at about 23%.
Roh Tae-Moon, acting head of the DX institutional sector at Samsung Electronics (president), who oversees the smartphone and home appliance businesses, also bought 5,000 shares of Samsung Electronics at 73,500 won per share in June last year, followed by an additional 5,000 shares at 69,500 won per share in September. He then purchased another 5,000 shares at 60,000 won per share in October last year. Even excluding the stock bonus in treasury shares received in July this year (70,400 won per share), the paper gain rate on the 15,000 shares bought on the market comes to 25.3%.
Given that the average purchase price of other executives who bought Samsung Electronics shares in September last year was also in the 60,000 won range, they are expected to show double-digit paper gain rates. The reason Samsung Electronics executives embarked on a buying spree at the time was the emergence of management accountability as the share price turned down after peaking at 88,800 won. The Samsung Electronics share price slid intraday to 49,900 won in November last year, even earning the ignominious label of "490,000 won Samsung."
The slump at the time largely stemmed from Samsung Electronics' failure to maintain its leading position. In the high bandwidth memory (HBM) market, a key component for AI chips, it ceded the top spot to SK hynix, and for the first time ever, it also fell from No. 1 in DRAM market share in the first and second quarters of this year. The foundry (contract semiconductor manufacturing) division is also racking up quarterly losses in the trillion-won range, lagging behind Taiwan's TSMC, the world's largest foundry corporations.
But as the industry picked up starting in June, the share price also began to rebound. As semiconductor demand in the AI industry expanded to commodity DRAM and NAND flash, product prices showed an upward trend. The previously sluggish Samsung Electronics share price also rose steeply from June. Samsung Electronics' share price gain in the second half of this year exceeds 50%.
Micron Technology in the United States (MU; Micron), which is called the "semiconductor barometer" for being the first among memory semiconductor corporations to report results, also released results on the day for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025 (June–August) that beat market expectations.
Micron in particular guided adjusted earnings per share (EPS) for the first quarter of fiscal 2026 (September–October 2025) at $3.60–$3.90 (midpoint $3.75). That is more than 20% above the market estimate ($3.05).
The key is whether Samsung Electronics can regain market dominance as the memory semiconductor cycle recovers. The preliminary results for the third quarter (June–September) due out in early Oct. will be the first checkpoint. Brokerages currently expect Samsung Electronics' third-quarter operating profit at 9.6687 trillion won, up by about 900 billion won in a month. Global investment banks (IB) are betting on a recovery to the 10 trillion won level.