SK hynix Earned 66 Trillion Won in U.S. Last Year... NVIDIA Revenue Also Doubled

SK hynix achieved remarkable performance growth in the United States last year, where many global big tech (large information technology) companies are concentrated.

Yonhap News Agency

According to the annual business report disclosed by SK hynix on March 17, its U.S. sales subsidiary, SK hynix America, recorded sales of 58.6933 trillion won and a net profit of 235.9 billion won last year. This represents a dramatic increase of 75.4% compared to the previous year's sales of 33.459 trillion won. During this period, total sales generated from U.S. customers, including the U.S. sales subsidiary, amounted to 66.8851 trillion won, accounting for 69% of SK hynix's total sales (about 97 trillion won) last year.

Notably, SK hynix is estimated to have generated 23.2601 trillion won in revenue from NVIDIA, its largest customer. This figure more than doubled from 10.9028 trillion won in the previous year, accounting for 23.9% of the company’s total sales during the same period.

Previously, SK hynix supplied most of the fifth-generation high bandwidth memory (HBM3E) to NVIDIA, and it is reported that the company has secured more than two-thirds of NVIDIA’s allocation for HBM4 (6th generation) as well. On March 16 (local time), SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won visited the 'GTC 2026' event in the United States and demonstrated his close relationship with NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang by visiting the SK hynix booth together.

These strong results have led to improved financial soundness for SK hynix. The company’s cash and cash equivalents were tallied at 34.9423 trillion won last year, a surge of 146.8% (an increase of 20.7859 trillion won) compared to 2024 (14.1564 trillion won). Meanwhile, total borrowings decreased by about 435.8 billion won, significantly lowering the debt ratio from 62.15% to 45.95%. In other words, SK hynix replenished its cash reserves and rapidly repaid debt with earnings from operations.

SK hynix also did not spare investments aimed at boosting employee morale. Last year, the average salary of SK hynix employees reached a record high of 185 million won, an increase of 58.1% compared to the previous year's average of 117 million won. The company also invested a record 6.7325 trillion won in research and development (R&D). As the head of the group, Chairman Chey received a total of 4.75 billion won from SK hynix last year, including 3.5 billion won in salary and 1.25 billion won in bonuses.

Meanwhile, SK hynix’s stock price soared by 278% over the past year, and the number of minority shareholders grew to 1,186,328, making it a “one-million-shareholder” company. Minority shareholders now hold 63.34% of all issued shares. Based on last year’s record-high earnings, SK hynix plans to further strengthen shareholder returns.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.