SK hynix long-term agreements in 2026: what is documented about customer deposits for HBM and DRAM

SK hynix confirmed on its second-quarter earnings call on Wednesday, July 29, 2026 that it had concluded long-term agreements (LTAs) with about 10 customers, typically running five years and backed by financial mechanisms such as customer deposits. The company did not name the customers, did not give a deposit total, and said it could not state how much of its sales the agreements cover. As of Saturday, October 3, 2026, those three gaps remain open in the public record.

What SK hynix has said about LTA customer prepayments for HBM and DRAM

The July 29 disclosure described agreements written separately for each customer and each product. They contain purchase commitments for multi-year volumes, pricing structures that the company said are designed to address price volatility, and deposits that support contract fulfilment. Management said talks with other large customers were continuing.

TrendForce reported on July 2, 2026 that SK hynix had removed the price ceiling that memory contracts normally carry, so that a rise in market prices passes through to the contract price. The same report said SK hynix and Samsung were stretching contract terms from the traditional one year to three to five years. SK hynix has not confirmed any counterparty by name.

How the three memory suppliers compare

Micron is the only one of the three that has put a number on the cash. Its fiscal fourth-quarter prepared remarks said customer cash deposits received in that quarter alone were $12.3 billion, and that the 26 agreements are estimated to represent more than 35% of revenue through 2030. Micron had reported 16 such agreements in June 2026. Micron describes its contracts as take-or-pay, with a ceiling and a floor on price for most of the volume. SK hynix, by TrendForce's account, kept the floor and dropped the ceiling.

Who carries the capital risk in a prepaid LTA

Memory was historically sold on quarterly contract prices and on the spot market. A supplier committed several years and tens of trillions of won to a new fab, then sold the output at whatever price prevailed when the wafers came out. In a downturn the buyer could walk away and the supplier absorbed the loss on idle capacity. Earlier LTAs existed, but they were mostly volume intentions with little money behind them.

High-bandwidth memory changed that. HBM is built to a specific customer's accelerator, qualified over many months, and consumes far more wafer capacity per bit than standard DRAM. Capacity assigned to HBM cannot be redirected quickly, so the supplier wants the buyer's commitment before the equipment is ordered. A deposit secures that commitment. The buyer advances cash, the supplier reserves volume, and if the buyer fails to take the committed volume the supplier can keep part of the advance. Part of the downturn risk moves from the chipmaker to the customer, and the cash arrives during the years the fab is being built.

Where the cash appears in the accounts

Under IFRS 15, cash received from a customer before goods are delivered is recorded as a contract liability. It is an obligation to deliver product, and it turns into revenue only as chips ship against it. A deposit that is refundable and serves purely as security can instead be carried as a financial liability. Either way the money sits on the liability side of the balance sheet and in operating cash flow, and it does not lift reported revenue or profit in the quarter it is received. SK hynix has not yet broken out a deposit balance tied to these agreements in its results materials, which is why the size of its prepayments cannot be stated from company disclosures.