Riding a boom in AI semiconductors, SK hynix posted record annual revenue and operating profit last year, and its operating profit topped Samsung Electronics’ annual operating profit for the first time.
SK hynix said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday that it posted 97.1467 trillion won ($97,146.7 billion) in revenue and 47.2063 trillion won ($47,206.3 billion) in operating profit. Net profit was 42.9479 trillion won ($42,947.9 billion). Revenue rose 46.7% from a year earlier and operating profit jumped 101.1%.
The results surpassed the company’s previous record set in 2024. Revenue increased by more than 30 trillion won, and operating profit roughly doubled, setting a new annual high.
SK hynix’s operating profit also exceeded Samsung Electronics’ companywide operating profit of 43.53 trillion won ($43,530.0 billion) over the same period. SK hynix’s operating margin was 49%.
Momentum was especially strong in the fourth quarter, as demand rose not only for high-bandwidth memory, or HBM, but also for general-purpose server memory. SK hynix said it posted record quarterly figures, with revenue up 34% from the previous quarter to 32.8267 trillion won ($32,826.7 billion) and operating profit up 68% to 19.1696 trillion won ($19,169.6 billion). The operating margin was 58%.
The company said the AI market is shifting from training to inference, expanding demand for distributed architectures and increasing the importance of memory. It expects demand to keep growing across memory products, including high-performance memory such as HBM, as well as server DRAM and NAND.
SK hynix said it is the only company in the industry able to supply both HBM3E and HBM4 stably, and it will strengthen its technology lead along with verified quality and mass-production capabilities. It said HBM4, for which it built a mass-production system in September, is now being produced to meet customer-requested volumes. The company also said it is preparing to supply optimized products in custom HBM, which it described as an emerging next-generation competitive factor.
Backed by its record results, SK hynix said it will carry out shareholder returns totaling 2.1 trillion won ($2,100.0 billion).
It decided on an additional dividend of 1,500 won ($1.50) per share, totaling 1 trillion won ($1,000.0 billion). Including existing quarterly dividends, it set the year-end dividend at 1,875 won ($1.88) per share. Total dividends for 2025 will be 3,000 won ($3.00) per share, for an overall payout of about 2.1 trillion won ($2,100.0 billion).
The company also said it will cancel all of its treasury shares totaling about 15.3 million shares, equivalent to a 2.1% stake, to boost shareholder value. Based on the previous day’s closing price, the shares are worth about 12.2 trillion won ($12,200.0 billion).
Song Hyun-jong, president of SK hynix, said the company will pursue sustainable earnings growth based on differentiated technology while maintaining an optimal balance among future investment, financial stability and shareholder returns. He said SK hynix will strengthen its role as a core infrastructure partner in the AI era by helping customers meet AI performance requirements, beyond simply supplying products.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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