HBM Prices to More Than Double in 2027 on Supply Crunch, TrendForce Says - Seoul Economic Daily

TrendForce's decision to raise its 2027 HBM blended ASP forecast by 121% year-over-year signals a structural shift in the memory market rather than a cyclical spike. The core driver is the expanding s... Read original →

HBM pricing is undergoing a structural regime shift—from cyclical memory dynamics to scarcity pricing analogous to advanced logic nodes. TrendForce's 121% ASP revision for 2027 is not a spike; it is a repricing of the AI memory value chain. The technical crux: HBM4's hybrid bonding competes directly with conventional DRAM for the same wafer pool, creating a hard production trade-off. More revealing is the 8-layer vs. 12-layer paradox—base die cost is fixed, so fewer layers actually inflate per-gigabit pricing by 10-20%. GPU and ASIC designers have lost their stack-height-for-cost lever, forced to trade capacity access against unit price. Textbook seller's market. Strategically, coordinated target-price upgrades for Samsung and SK hynix signal consensus that HBM has graduated from a differentiating feature to a strategic chokepoint in AI compute. Micron's hybrid bonding lag will compound into share erosion by 2027. NVIDIA and peers face a permanently restructured BOM, with pricing power shifting irreversibly toward memory suppliers. The 12-24 month tail: HBM will spawn long-term capacity-lock contracts mirroring advanced foundry models—prepaid, dedicated, non-cancellable. TSV etch and bonding equipment visibility extends to 2028. The "cyclical stock" valuation anchor for memory is breaking. By 2027, HBM pricing power is functionally equivalent to 2nm logic node pricing power.