SK Hynix Is Removing Price Caps From Its Memory Contracts — a Break From How the Industry Has Priced HBM for Years

SK hynix is reportedly removing the price cap from its long-term memory supply agreements, according to TrendForce reporting, allowing spot-market price increases during supply shortages to flow directly into contract pricing rather than being capped at a pre-negotiated ceiling. That is a structural break from how memory long-term agreements have traditionally worked, and it diverges specifically from rival Micron's approach — giving SK hynix greater pricing upside in a market where HBM demand for AI accelerators has been running ahead of supply.

The shift is part of a broader change in how the two dominant HBM suppliers, SK hynix and Samsung, are structuring customer relationships. Both have moved away from one-year, short-term supply contracts with major hyperscalers and chipmakers toward multi-year long-term agreements spanning three to five years. SK hynix has concluded roughly 10 such LTA negotiations with key customers, with further discussions ongoing, and the agreements incorporate financial mechanisms such as deposits to support contract fulfillment — effectively locking both sides into commitments that give customers demand visibility and give SK hynix committed volume and revenue further out.

Samsung's position in the same supply chain adds another data point to the picture: the company's more advanced 4nm foundry capacity is fully booked through 2027, driven by HBM4 base-die production and Nvidia orders. With 4nm capacity constrained, Samsung has been promoting its 5nm process as a lower-cost alternative for customers unable to secure 4nm slots — a sign that capacity, not just memory chip supply, is a binding constraint across the AI hardware buildout.

Together, these two moves — SK hynix's uncapped pricing structure and Samsung's fully-booked advanced-node capacity — describe a supply chain where the dominant suppliers are using contract structure and capacity allocation, not just headline pricing, to manage a demand environment they can't fully satisfy in the near term.