AI Memory for 2027 Is Sold Out Before It's Made: What the Evidence Says

On Thursday 29 October in Seoul, Samsung Electronics told analysts that its 2027 supply of high-bandwidth memory (HBM), the stacked chips that sit beside AI processors, is already sold out. That is the story Wall Street is telling about memory, in one line: next year’s AI memory is booked before it is made, so its price rises and the makers’ record profits last.

A day earlier SK hynix said long-term contracts with 14 customers cover more than half of its 2027 and 2028 production capacity. TrendForce, a Taiwan-based market tracker, expects HBM prices to rise 121% next year.

The stakes: Micron (MU), the American member of the three HBM makers, is up 210.0% this year but closed Friday 27.1% below its 25 June high, by our price files.

The story in one sentence

“Our 2027 HBM supply volume is already sold out at an agreed target price.” Kim Jae-june, executive vice president for memory sales and marketing at Samsung Electronics, on its earnings call on Thursday 29 October

The chain runs like this. HBM and ordinary DRAM, the working memory in servers, PCs and phones, compete for the same scarce factory capacity, TrendForce says. HBM has been priced once a year, so it missed this year’s jumps in DRAM prices, and by the first quarter it earned makers less than a standard server memory module, the firm said on 2 June.

If buyers want more HBM in 2027, they have to pay at least what the same wafers would earn as ordinary memory. That means higher profits for SK hynix, Samsung and Micron, and higher costs for Nvidia (NVDA) and the cloud companies that buy its chips.

The evidence for it

1. Samsung says its 2027 HBM is sold out

Samsung said on its 29 October call that its 2027 HBM supply is sold out at agreed target prices and that key customers keep asking for more, according to the call transcript published by Investing.com and to Korea JoongAng Daily. Sales of its newest generation, HBM4, more than tripled from the second quarter and made up 60% of its HBM sales.

It has signed multi-year contracts with 10 major customers and is negotiating with as many again. Its goal is to cover 60% to 70% of its capacity through 2030 with such deals, Kim said.

2. SK hynix has contracts on more than half of 2027 and 2028

SK hynix said on 28 October that long-term agreements with 14 major customers cover more than half of its production capacity for 2027 and 2028, up from 10 customers in the second quarter, TrendForce reported. The contracts typically run five years, with prices “within a price range agreed upon with customers,” its results release said.

Korea’s iNews24 reported that SK hynix has also settled 2027 HBM volumes and prices with its major customers, according to TrendForce. The company expects demand for memory to exceed supply through 2030, and HBM4 to overtake the older HBM3E in shipments and revenue this quarter.

3. HBM prices are set to catch up with ordinary memory

TrendForce estimates that contract prices for conventional DRAM jumped 93% to 98% in the first quarter alone, while HBM contract prices fell in 2026 under annual pricing. That gap gives suppliers “strong justification” to raise HBM prices for 2027, the firm wrote on 2 June. Our chart of DRAM prices by quarter shows the climb.

On 29 September it raised its 2027 outlook and now expects the average selling price across HBM types to rise 121% from 2026; in August it had put the likely rise at 70% to 140%. KB Securities expects Samsung’s HBM prices to more than double, The Korea Herald reported.

4. Three makers are racing to feed Nvidia’s next chip

Nvidia’s next AI platform, Vera Rubin, uses HBM4. Korean outlets reported in March that Samsung and SK hynix had been chosen to supply it (KED Global, and Hankyung via TrendForce), and on 18 March Micron said it had started volume production of HBM4 for Vera Rubin, SiliconANGLE and Tiger Brokers’ news service reported.

Nvidia Chief Executive Jensen Huang said in Seoul on 8 June, after signing a multi-year partnership with SK hynix, that it “will continue to be Nvidia’s largest memory partner,” Reuters reported. Yonhap reported in January that SK hynix would get about two-thirds of Nvidia’s HBM4 demand for Rubin; no company has confirmed that share.

The case against it

The doubters don’t dispute that 2027 is booked. They dispute what comes after it. Pzena Investment Management, a value fund that owns Samsung, wrote in May that today’s margins are “likely to mark the peak of the current cycle”; Counterpoint Research expects DRAM prices to fall about 23% in 2028, CNBC reported on 15 October.

Kyung Kye-hyun, a Samsung senior adviser and former head of its chip division, warned at a Korean engineering forum in May that new Chinese capacity could push memory prices down from late 2027 or early 2028, Notebookcheck and PC Gamer reported. Our bulls-vs-bears piece has the full debate; three points matter most for this story.

1. HBM is a small slice of memory. Pzena estimates HBM is about 12% of DRAM bit demand this year. The rest goes into phones, PCs and servers whose buyers cut back when prices rise: Intel blamed a memory shortage for weak PC demand on 29 October, Reuters and The Next Web reported.
2. New supply lands in 2028. Pzena points to capacity the three big makers will add in 2027 and 2028, and Kyung said China’s DRAM output could reach six million wafers a month in the second half of 2027. Not everyone buys the China threat: Rosenblatt Securities analyst Kevin Cassidy told CNBC that a new design from China’s CXMT won’t “swing the supply-demand equation at all.”
3. The contracts cap the upside, too. SK hynix’s deals set prices within agreed ranges, and Micron’s annual report says most of its multi-year agreements have prices “subject to minimum and maximum bands.” TrendForce expects some suppliers’ server DRAM increases to lag the market because of such terms.

We think the second point is the strongest. A booked 2027 says nothing about 2028, and that is the year memory investors are already trying to price.

What would change minds

• Tuesday 17 November: Nvidia reports after the close, with its call at 5 p.m. ET. A cut to its outlook would put 2027 HBM volumes in doubt; a warning that memory costs are squeezing its margins would show the price increases are landing.
• December: Micron reports its fiscal first quarter, on a date it hasn’t announced. It guided revenue of about $61.5 billion and an adjusted gross margin of about 86.25%; a margin below that would be the first sign that contract price bands are biting.
• Around the turn of the year: TrendForce’s first-quarter 2027 contract-price forecast (this year’s came on 5 January). A forecast of falling conventional DRAM prices would leave HBM’s repricing as the only thing still lifting memory makers’ prices.

The stocks exposed

Our read

The evidence supports it. Samsung says its 2027 HBM is sold out, SK hynix has more than half of its 2027 capacity under contract, and the contract terms (multi-year, take-or-pay at Micron, priced within bands) are in filings, not just on slides. The weakest link is price: the doubling is a forecast, no maker has disclosed a contract price, and we found no statement from Micron that its own 2027 HBM is sold.

The number we’ll watch is Micron’s gross margin in December against its 86.25% guide.