AI stocks signal memory premium starting to fade

AI stocks signal memory premium starting to fade

New York, July 13, 2026, 16:26 (EDT)

AI stocks ended Monday in the red, though losses varied across the sector. A group of three memory and storage plays tied to AI dropped 7.2%, nearly double the 3.7% loss for a set of four compute and foundry names. The split points to investors shortening their view on how long shortage-fueled gains can last, despite healthy order books and continued spend on infrastructure.

The comparison assigns equal weight to every company. It’s meant to track how the session moved internally, not as something to invest in.

Monday exposureConstituents and close-to-close moveEqual-weighted move
Memory and storageSanDisk fell 12.7%. Micron Technology off 4.3%. Western Digital down 4.7%.-7.2%
Core compute and foundryNvidia lost 3.5%. Advanced Micro Devices dropped 4.2%. Broadcom slipped 4.1%. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. dropped 2.9%.-3.7%
Semiconductor benchmarkiShares Semiconductor ETF -4.9%

High-bandwidth memory, or HBM, was the clear pressure point. SK Hynix took 58% of HBM revenue in Q1. Micron and Samsung Electronics each had 21%. SK Hynix shares in Seoul dropped 15.4%. Even after that, its U.S. ADRs still traded 25.6% above the Korean shares. Morningstar analyst Jing Jie Yu said “fresh capacity in 2027 and 2028 … will improve supply dynamics, thereby leading to price erosion.” Reuters

Fresh demand data pushed back on talk of an AI order slump. TSMC reported June revenue up 67.9% year-on-year to NT$442.68 billion and said second-quarter sales jumped 36%, hitting a record NT$1.27 trillion. Meta Platforms grew its Louisiana Hyperion data-center plan to 5 gigawatts, up from 2 gigawatts, and lifted projected spending to more than $50 billion. One gigawatt is one billion watts. Shares of Meta slipped 1.9%.

CompanyNew operating signalMonday reaction
TSMCJune revenue up 67.9% from last year, hit a new Q2 high-2.9%
Meta PlatformsHyperion now at 5 gigawatts, investment exceeds $50 billion-1.9%
SK HynixHBM now 58% of revenue; U.S. listing still trades well over KoreaSeoul shares down 15.4%

The breakup shows investors are thinking about how long profits will last. TSMC, as a foundry, makes chips for different companies and gets paid by many types of buyers. Memory and storage makers’ profits rise more when supplies are tight and parts get pricier. Traders on Monday sold shares in the firms that need scarcity to keep lifting earnings through 2027 and 2028.

Positioning set up the reversal, with funds tracking U.S. semiconductor stocks posting about $11 billion in outflows for the week ended June 24. That’s the biggest weekly outflow this century, after the group took in around $12 billion over the previous two weeks. Short interest, or the amount of stock borrowed and sold by bears, is at its highest in three years. The Philadelphia semiconductor index is still up 83% on the year, even after dropping more than 11% since its June peak. “We’ve never seen this kind of extreme earnings growth. But the question then becomes, how long can we expect this to continue,” said Steve Sosnick, strategist at Interactive Brokers. Reuters

The wider shock pushed up the cost to finance long-term AI projects. Crude oil finished up 9.4%. Markets priced in at least one more quarter-point U.S. rate hike by year-end. A basis point equals one-hundredth of a percentage point. Oracle dropped 6.3%, and Intel fell 6.1%. Ross Mayfield, strategist at Baird, questioned “the deluge of corporate issuance to fund this AI capex.” Capital expenditure, or capex, covers spending on long-lived assets like chip plants and data centers. Reuters

The scarcity trade could bounce back fast if supply stays tight. SK Hynix CEO Kwak Noh-jung said, “We forecast that next year will be the worst year in the industry’s history from the supply perspective.” The other risk is that new plants start making chips in 2027 and 2028, just as higher power and borrowing costs slow customer rollouts, pushing memory prices down before more sales can make up for it. Reuters

First up this week, the U.S. consumer-price numbers land Tuesday at 08:30 EDT. Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh is set to go before the Senate Banking Committee Wednesday. TSMC delivers full Q2 results on Thursday. If inflation runs hot or if TSMC signals caution, Monday’s repricing gets support. But if margins are strong and their demand outlook improves, investors look like they got ahead of the news.

Iwona Majkowska is a financial markets journalist at TS2.tech, specializing in stocks, artificial intelligence and technology. A graduate of the Warsaw School of Economics, she previously worked in equity research and financial analysis before focusing on market reporting. Her daily coverage helps investors follow major developments across U.S. and global markets. Follow Iwona Majkowska on Google News.

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