Shares of SK hynix cratered nearly 15% in Seoul on Tuesday, capping a brutal stretch that has erased roughly $600 billion in market value since the stock's June peak. The sell-off — the chipmaker's worst single-day drop in 2026 — dragged U.S.-listed shares below their IPO price for the first time, signaling that investor confidence in the AI hardware trade is fracturing fast. SK hynix Posts Record Profits but the Market Doesn't Care — Can Anything Stop This Free Fall?

Shares shifted violently as SK hynix's stock plummeted 14.65% in Seoul on Tuesday, dragging the KOSPI down 10.8% and triggering a circuit breaker for the eighth time in 2026 alone — more than the six total triggers recorded across all preceding years since the mechanism was introduced. The rout deepened Wednesday: the KOSPI circuit breaker fired for the second consecutive day — a historic first — even after SK hynix reported record Q2 results. For shareholders who bought the company's blockbuster $26.5 billion Nasdaq IPO on July 10, the message is stark: record earnings no longer guarantee a floor.

  • China's Chip Push Landed at the Worst Possible Moment. China's first domestic immersion DUV lithography machines entered service at SMIC and CXMT, and CXMT's $8.6 billion IPO raised fears of DRAM oversupply.

Kiwoom Securities analyst Han Ji-young said reports of Chinese-made lithography equipment "reignited concerns that Chinese memory-chip makers could accelerate capacity expansion." The threat is still early — as of mid-2026, roughly 2% of CXMT's wafer capacity targets high-bandwidth memory, a generation behind what SK hynix ships — but markets price fear before proof.

  • Record Profits Still Missed the Bar. SK hynix's Q2 revenue rose 257% year-over-year and operating profit surged 557%. Yet the 557% profit jump still missed forecasts, and the stock fell another ~10% on Wednesday. Analysts had projected operating margins potentially exceeding 75%, and a single quarter's profit was expected to surpass the company's full-year 2025 level of 47.2 trillion won. When expectations are that extreme, even blowout numbers disappoint.

  • The IPO Premium Has Evaporated. U.S.-listed shares closed at $143.02, the first close below their $149 IPO price, just 18 days after debuting. The KOSPI has slumped more than 30% in July after a rally that "relied almost entirely on two chipmakers: Samsung and SK Hynix." That concentration is now working in reverse: together, the two firms account for nearly half the index.

  • AI Spending Anxiety Is the Deeper Problem. KB Securities estimates that sales to big tech and AI data-center operators account for about 70% of SK hynix's Q2 revenue. That makes the stock a leveraged bet on whether hyperscalers keep spending at the current pace. Investors remain concerned that major technology companies could scale back AI infrastructure spending, potentially weighing on future demand. Until that question is answered, record earnings may not matter.