After a 62% surge in stock price this year, Micron faces a major earnings test tonight.

AI · How is AI chip demand fueling the memory shortage crisis?

The demand for AI chips has triggered a memory shortage, bringing Micron Technology into the spotlight.

Micron will announce its Q2 FY2026 earnings after the U.S. stock market closes on Wednesday. Analysts expect its revenue to increase by as much as 148% year-over-year.

This memory chip manufacturer’s stock has risen approximately 62% so far this year, making it the only company among the top ten U.S. tech firms by market value to see gains this year, with its market cap reaching $520 billion, surpassing Oracle’s $445 billion.

The direct driver of the memory chip shortage is the procurement race among major tech giants competing for AI computing power. According to LSEG data, analysts expect Micron’s average DRAM selling price in Q2 to climb nearly 32% quarter-over-quarter. This price surge has begun to spread to the PC and smartphone markets, prompting industry research firms to lower their forecasts for end-device shipments.

Supply and demand imbalance boosts earnings expectations

The acceleration of AI infrastructure development is the core driver of this round of memory shortages. Jensen Huang stated at NVIDIA’s GTC conference on Monday that he expects procurement orders for Blackwell and Vera Rubin GPUs to reach $1 trillion before 2027.

Cloud giants Amazon and Google are also continuously raising capital expenditure forecasts, as their data centers require大量搭载存储芯片的英伟达GPU机架。

According to RBC analysts’ estimates in a research report, the DRAM required for NVIDIA’s Vera Rubin NVL72 system is about three times that of the Grace Blackwell GB300 NVL72 rack. Each Rubin Ultra GPU will be equipped with 1TB of high-performance HBM4e memory, which is more than three times that of a single Rubin GPU.

Micron announced in December last year that its high-bandwidth memory (HBM) capacity for 2026 is fully sold out. Micron’s competitor SK Hynix’s parent company chairman Choi Tae-yoon stated at NVIDIA’s GTC conference this week that this round of memory shortages will last four to five years.

Looking ahead to the third quarter, analysts summarized by StreetAccount expect Micron’s adjusted gross margin to exceed 71%, with revenue potentially reaching $23.8 billion, representing an increase of nearly 156% year-over-year.

Expansion plans still require time to implement

In response to strong demand, Micron has launched multiple capacity expansion projects, but the actual release of new supply still awaits.

In January, Micron held a groundbreaking ceremony in northern New York, with plans to build up to four wafer fabrication plants there; in February, the company opened a packaging and testing plant in India to process memory wafers into finished products.

Micron CEO, in an interview with CNBC in January, described memory as a strategic asset in the AI era. “Memory is the core enabler of AI,” he said. “It’s not just a component in a system anymore. It’s a strategic asset, like your brain—you need more memory, and faster memory.”

Micron will hold an analyst call at 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time, where investors will focus on the company’s guidance for upcoming quarters and the latest progress on HBM capacity expansion.

Price surge hampers PC and smartphone markets

The price pressures caused by tight memory supply have propagated down the supply chain. Industry research firm TrendForce reported in February that contract prices for PC DRAM have “significantly increased” this quarter. RBC analysts cited TrendForce data predicting that the first quarter of 2026 will see an 80% to 85% increase in hybrid DRAM prices.

Market research firm IDC lowered its PC shipment forecast last week, expecting an 11.3% decline this year, a significant downgrade from its November forecast of a 2.4% decline; smartphone shipments are also expected to fall by 12.9%. IDC research manager Jitesh Ubrani stated, “Memory shortages will continue into 2027 and beyond.”

Dell’s Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke also warned analysts of this pressure during the company’s February earnings call. He noted that over the past six months, DRAM costs have increased 5.5 times, and NAND flash costs have quadrupled. “We are working closely with our memory partners to stay as flexible and agile as possible.”