Record for SK hynix: quarterly revenue tops 100 trillion won for the first time
South Korean memory chipmaker SK hynix reported a 328% jump in third-quarter revenue and an operating profit of 83.3 trillion won. Its new HBM4 memory is set to become its main product.
Symbolic image · Photo: ArnoldReinhold / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
South Korean memory chipmaker SK hynix said its third-quarter 2026 revenue reached 104.6 trillion won. That is more than four times the figure a year earlier, up 328%, and the first time in the company's history that quarterly sales exceeded 100 trillion won. Operating profit rose 632% to 83.3 trillion won, for an operating margin of 80%.
The main driver is high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for data centers. According to SK hynix, shipments of the new HBM4 generation began in earnest during the quarter. The company expects HBM4 to overtake its predecessor HBM3E in both volume and revenue as early as the fourth quarter, and plans to run its M15X plant at full capacity by year-end. Long-term agreements with 14 key customers cover more than half of its 2027 and 2028 capacity, executives said on the earnings call.
The company plans to return about 100 trillion won to shareholders in 2026 through dividends and share buybacks. For the third quarter it set a payout of 20,000 won per share, including a special dividend of 10,000 won from gains on its stake in memory maker Kioxia. "Our principle has been to share the majority of the gains from successful strategic investments with our shareholders," CEO Kwak Noh-Jung said.