Samsung Electronics is on track to post its biggest quarterly profit in over three years, a stunning turnaround driven by the global race for artificial intelligence. The massive demand for AI has created a shortage of conventional memory chips, sending prices soaring and delivering a huge windfall for the Korean tech giant.
Samsung, the world’s largest memory chip maker, said it expects to report an operating profit of 12.1 trillion won (about $8.5 billion) for the third quarter, a 32% jump from last year and well ahead of what analysts were expecting. The news sent Samsung’s stock to its highest level since 2021.
The surprise earnings beat is ironic. Samsung has actually been lagging behind its rivals in the race to supply the most advanced, high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips for AI. But as all the big chipmakers have focused their efforts on these new, high-end chips, they’ve created a shortage of the more conventional memory chips that are also needed for AI servers. This has driven up prices and played right into Samsung’s traditional strength.
“Samsung is a big beneficiary of growing demand for commodity chips,” said one analyst. Prices for some of these conventional DRAM chips jumped by an incredible 171.8% in the third quarter from a year ago, and analysts expect the shortage to continue.
While there are still some uncertainties, including potential U.S. tariffs and the ongoing U.S.-China trade war, the message from Samsung’s strong forecast is clear: the AI boom is so massive that it’s lifting all boats, even for the chips that aren’t on the cutting edge.
