SK Hynix’s $26.5B U.S. IPO puts AI memory demand in focus

SK Hynix raised $26.5 billion, or KRW 40 trillion, in its U.S. market debut. The company sold 177.9 million American depositary shares at $149 each, giving U.S. investors a way to buy in at roughly a tenth of the price of a full Seoul-listed share.

The deal was described as the largest-ever U.S. debut by a non-American company, surpassing Alibaba’s $25 billion IPO in 2014. SK Hynix began trading Friday, July 10, under the temporary ticker SKHYV, with regular trading set to open Monday, July 13, under SKHY.

The offering comes as the AI chip boom intensifies demand for memory chips, especially high-bandwidth memory, or HBM. SK Hynix makes HBM, a key component in AI GPU processors, and Nvidia relies on the company as one of its primary suppliers.

That positioning helps explain why the company appears to be breaking away from the so-called Korea Discount, the valuation gap often applied to Korean companies because of governance, shareholder return, regulatory, and geopolitical concerns.

According to the filing cited in the article, the proceeds are slated for three areas: a new fab in South Korea, a new packaging facility in South Korea, and EUV scanners used to make next-generation chips possible.

The fab is being built to address the worldwide memory shortage linked to AI demand. For readers tracking the AI infrastructure buildout, the key takeaway is that capital is flowing not just into model companies and GPUs, but into the memory supply chain behind them.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick reportedly said he is in talks with Samsung and SK Hynix about building new factories in the U.S. The push reflects concern that South Korea continues to dominate a strategically important part of the technology stack.

Micron, one of SK Hynix’s biggest competitors, has announced plans to invest $250 billion in new U.S. manufacturing and said that commitment will create more than 90,000 jobs. The timing is notable because Korean chipmakers also recently pledged more than $550 billion for new manufacturing investment in South Korea.