Mirae Asset raises SK Hynix target price as HBM customer base broadens beyond Nvidia

Mirae Asset Securities raised its target price for SK Hynix on September 7th by 10.7%, from 2.8m won to 3.1m won per share, while maintaining a "buy" recommendation. Based on the closing price of 1,647,000 won on September 4th, that implies upside of 88.2%.

The upgrade is driven by accelerating diversification of SK Hynix's customer base for high-bandwidth memory (HBM)—a premium type of memory chip that stacks multiple DRAM dies to deliver far greater speed and capacity than conventional alternatives. Mirae Asset argues that the HBM supply chain, previously centred almost entirely on Nvidia, is rapidly expanding to include AMD, Meta, and OpenAI, all of which are developing custom AI chips (known as ASICs, or application-specific integrated circuits). The simultaneous growth in HBM content across both graphics processing units (GPUs) and custom silicon is, in the brokerage's view, a structural tailwind for SK Hynix.

The numbers bear this out. AMD's MI455X accelerator packs 432GB of HBM4 across 12 stacks—a 50% increase in memory capacity over its predecessor, the MI355X. Nvidia, meanwhile, is set to equip its forthcoming Rubin GPU with 288GB of HBM4. More significantly, its Rubin CPX variant, previously expected to use GDDR7 memory, is reportedly being reconsidered in favour of 168GB of HBM4—a notable shift that would substantially expand the addressable HBM market.

Custom-chip makers are moving in the same direction. Meta's MTIA 400 accelerator will feature 288GB of HBM3E across eight stacks, delivering 9.4TB/s of bandwidth, with mass production scheduled for the second half of this year; subsequent generations—the MTIA 4500 and MTIA 500—are planned to double and then further increase HBM bandwidth by 50%. Microsoft's MAIA 200, which uses 216GB of HBM3E across six 12-layer stacks (7TB/s), has already begun deployment on its Azure cloud platform. OpenAI's Jalapeno chip, unveiled at Hot Chips 2026, stands out as the only ASIC at the conference to have adopted HBM4, carrying 216GiB at 15.4TB/s; in a 2,048-chip pod configuration, that translates to 432TiB of total capacity and 32PB/s of aggregate bandwidth.

Mirae Asset summarises the trend succinctly: HBM content per big-tech ASIC is converging on a range of 216–288GB; 12-layer HBM3E is giving way to HBM4; and the next generation will push bandwidth further still. As the market leader in HBM—a position SK Hynix has held with a commanding share—the company stands to benefit disproportionately from this broadening of the customer base, which reduces the concentration risk that has long been cited as a vulnerability.

The financial outlook is correspondingly bullish. Mirae Asset forecasts SK Hynix's revenue at 33 trillion won for 2026, with operating profit of 25.5 trillion won and an operating margin of 77.3%—a dramatic improvement from an estimated 48.6% in 2025. Quarterly operating profit is projected at 7.3 trillion won in the third quarter of 2026 and 8.4 trillion won in the fourth, rising to 38.6 trillion won for the full year of 2027. DRAM average selling prices are expected to rise 15.8% year-on-year in 2026, 7.2% in 2027, and 23.9% in 2028.

That said, Mirae Asset has trimmed its 2026 and 2027 operating profit estimates by 4.8% and 5.6% respectively, owing to a revised assumption on the Korean won-US dollar exchange rate—adjusted from 1,553 won to 1,400 won per dollar, reflecting the won's recent appreciation. This revision pushed the Q3 2026 revenue estimate down 7.9% to 92.6 trillion won and operating profit down 7.6% to 73.2 trillion won. The target price calculation uses a 12-month forward book value per share of 768,383 won and a price-to-book multiple of 4.1 times—a 10% discount to the average of US peer Micron Technology and Japan's Kioxia—with the forward-looking window extended from Q2 to Q3 2027 to reflect the passage of time.

Currency risk is therefore the principal variable to watch. Any further strengthening of the won against the dollar would put additional downward pressure on earnings estimates, which are already sensitive to exchange-rate movements given that semiconductor revenues are predominantly dollar-denominated.

On valuation, Mirae Asset argues the stock remains compelling. At current prices, SK Hynix trades at just 3.1 times its estimated 2027 earnings per share and 1.6 times book value—levels the brokerage describes as exceptionally low in absolute terms. Even at the new target price, the implied multiples are only 5.9 times earnings and 3.0 times book, leaving the investment case intact despite the downward revisions to near-term profit forecasts.

The broader context reinforces the optimism. HBM has become the central growth engine of the memory industry, propelled by insatiable demand for AI accelerators. SK Hynix has long dominated the market, but its heavy reliance on Nvidia has been a recurring concern among investors. The rapid adoption of HBM by a wider array of custom-chip designers dilutes that concentration risk materially. The main counterargument is competitive: if Samsung Electronics and Micron Technology mount a more serious challenge in HBM4, pricing pressure and market-share shifts could complicate the outlook—a risk that investors would be unwise to discount entirely.