NEW YORK, Jan 6, 2026, 10:27 EST
- Sandisk shares jump about 22% in early U.S. trade as investors chase AI-linked storage and memory names
- TrendForce forecasts NAND flash contract prices rising 33%–38% in the March quarter as server demand soaks up supply
- Research notes flag strong 2026 growth drivers, but warn Sandisk’s premium valuation leaves less room for setbacks
Sandisk Corp shares were up about 22% at $335 on Tuesday after touching an intraday high of $337.51, extending a sharp rally in flash-memory and storage stocks tied to artificial intelligence data centers.
The move follows fresh forecasts that memory pricing will keep rising as suppliers steer output toward server and AI hardware. TrendForce said NAND flash contract prices are expected to rise 33% to 38% from the prior quarter, while conventional DRAM contract prices are forecast to climb 55% to 60%.
NAND flash is the non-volatile memory used in solid-state drives, or SSDs, which store data in laptops and data centers. TrendForce said enterprise SSDs are set to become the largest NAND flash segment in 2026 as North American cloud service providers accelerate AI infrastructure spending.
Zacks Equity Research said Sandisk is engaged with five hyperscale customers — large cloud operators that run vast data centers — and is qualifying its “Stargate” enterprise SSDs through 2026, pointing to higher “storage intensity” as AI systems store and move more data per server. Source
A Seeking Alpha analysis on Tuesday rated Sandisk “Hold,” arguing that near-term AI-driven gains are largely priced in. The note projected more than 45% revenue growth in 2026 and said EBITDA — earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, a common proxy for operating profit — could rise more than 200% year on year; it also pegged the stock at about 21 times 2026 earnings, versus sub-10 multiples for Micron and SK Hynix. Source
Other memory names also gained, with Micron up about 7% in the session. Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said he expects “memory markets to remain tight past 2026,” Reuters reported, as chipmakers prioritize AI-related production and customers lock in supply. Source
Sandisk became an independent public company in February 2025 after completing its separation from Western Digital, the company said. Chief Executive David Goeckeler said at the time that “NAND is an incredible enabler,” as the company positioned its flash portfolio for both consumer devices and enterprise demand. Source
In a Dec. 31 column republished by Palmetto Grain, Barchart columnist Sushree Mohanty pointed to Sandisk’s outsized 2025 gains and argued that fast, power-efficient flash storage is becoming more central to AI and cloud workloads heading into 2026.
But memory is a cyclical business, and price spikes can reverse if buyers pull back or new supply comes on line. TrendFo
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