Memory Companies Have Destroyed the Consumer Market

Gamers Nexus

AI-assisted summary of Memory Companies Have Destroyed the Consumer Market — original source. Check the original for full context.

Source published: 2026-09-21

Key ideas

Memory fabricators are suppressing the industry's historical boom-and-bust cycle by locking 50% to 70% of DRAM and NAND production into multi-year Long-Term Agreements with AI hyperscalers through 2028 and beyond. (6:06)
The top nine cloud service providers are projected to increase capital expenditure to $1.383 trillion in 2027, with DRAM and NAND memory procurement alone accounting for 68% ($940 billion) of that total. (11:27)
Severe consumer inflation has driven 32 GB DDR5 kits up 363% and 2 TB NVMe drives up 137%, while open spot market pricing for DDR4 and DDR5 dies has surged between 800% and 958%. (15:11)
Political pushback against rising Chinese suppliers CXMT and YMTC clashes with domestic realities, as US fabs produced just 2% of global DRAM in 2023 and are projected to reach only 10% by 2035. (21:27)

Detailed notes

## Background Published on YouTube by Gamers Nexus on September 21, 2026, this investigative video examines how leading memory manufacturers have structurally dismantled the historical boom-and-bust pricing cycle of DRAM and NAND flash. According to the page description, suppliers like Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix have shifted massive production capacity into multi-year enterprise agreements with hyperscalers, choking consumer supply and driving hardware costs to unprecedented heights while political leaders tout distant, inadequate domestic manufacturing targets.

## TL;DR Host Steve Burke reports on the catastrophic price hikes across consumer RAM and SSDs, where 32GB and 64GB DDR5 kits have seen surges of several hundred percent due to silicon capacity being redirected to AI hyperscalers. The historic boom-and-bust memory cycle has been effectively broken as manufacturers lock down 50% to 70% of fab capacity in multi-year Long-Term Agreements (LTAs) with cloud giants like Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, while smaller on-premises businesses are priced out and forced into cloud subscriptions. Concurrently, US political bans on rising Chinese memory alternatives like CXMT and YMTC leave Western consumers stranded, especially since subsidized domestic expansions from Micron will only yield modest output by 2035. With industry analysts predicting prolonged shortfalls and retail shelves emptying, personal computing hardware is now inextricably trapped in geopolitical maneuvering and permanent price-floor inflation.

## Atmosphere & style The presentation carries Steve Burke's trademark dry, analytical, and relentlessly critical investigative tone, blending dense financial reporting with biting consumer advocacy. It feels sober and infuriating, methodically dismantling corporate earnings calls and political rhetoric with charts of skyrocketing component costs and spot-market spikes. Burke balances grave geopolitical and economic breakdowns with razor-sharp sarcasm, guiding the viewer through a grim realization that the golden era of budget DIY computing has been traded away for high-margin corporate cloud infrastructure.

## Bulletin - [06:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=366s) Memory fabricators are suppressing the industry's historical boom-and-bust cycle by locking 50% to 70% of DRAM and NAND production into multi-year Long-Term Agreements with AI hyperscalers through 2028 and beyond. - [11:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=687s) The top nine cloud service providers are projected to increase capital expenditure to $1.383 trillion in 2027, with DRAM and NAND memory procurement alone accounting for 68% ($940 billion) of that total. - [15:11](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=911s) Severe consumer inflation has driven 32 GB DDR5 kits up 363% and 2 TB NVMe drives up 137%, while open spot market pricing for DDR4 and DDR5 dies has surged between 800% and 958%. - [21:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1287s) Political pushback against rising Chinese suppliers CXMT and YMTC clashes with domestic realities, as US fabs produced just 2% of global DRAM in 2023 and are projected to reach only 10% by 2035.

## Key takeaways - [06:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=366s) Memory fabricators like Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix have shifted toward multi-year Long-Term Agreements (LTAs) that lock in up to 70% of factory output for enterprise hyperscalers, structurally dismantling the traditional consumer price relief cycle. - [00:01](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1s) Retail memory and storage pricing has experienced massive spikes, with 32 GB DDR5 kits jumping 363% to $567.50, 64 GB kits approaching $1,400, and workstation memory configurations inflating to over $23,800. - [03:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=182s) Memory component shortages have cascaded across consumer electronics, forcing a 27.6% surge in smartphone average selling prices, console price hikes by Sony and Microsoft, and broader portfolio increases by Apple and Amazon. - [09:52](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=592s) Western Digital, Samsung, and other fabricators are securing supply contracts extending as far as 2031, transforming semiconductor manufacturing from cyclical spot markets into rigid, pre-sold order books. - [11:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=687s) Cloud giants are creating a self-reinforcing monopoly: massive hardware procurement prices out on-premises server upgrades for smaller enterprises, forcing them to subscribe to AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. - [13:56](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=836s) Global wafer allocations are decoupling from client computing, with TrendForce forecasting that desktop and laptop PCs will account for only 5.6% of global DRAM bit demand and 11.5% of NAND demand by 2027. - [16:55](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1015s) Spot market die pricing has exhibited speculative, cryptocurrency-like volatility, with 16Gb DDR4 die prices increasing by 958% and 16Gb DDR5 dies climbing 800% between late 2025 and 2026. - [18:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1110s) Chinese memory producers are rapidly filling the supply void, with CXMT capturing 10% of global DRAM revenue and YMTC entering the top three global NAND makers by routing packaged chips through third parties. - [20:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1228s) Washington policymakers have strongly opposed Western adoption of Chinese memory, yet domestic manufacturing remains negligible and is projected to reach only 10% of global capacity by 2035—mostly earmarked for enterprise HBM. - [24:19](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1459s) Despite receiving roughly $6.5 billion in CHIPS Act subsidies and local tax abatements, Micron faces no regulatory obligations to supply domestic consumer electronics, sparking industry calls to invoke the Defense Production Act. - [26:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1581s) Market research diverges from component suppliers: while TrendForce models project a NAND flash surplus by 2027, Silicon Motion warns the shortage will worsen and that the retail SSD market has virtually disappeared. - [27:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1640s) The traditional separation between consumer PC hardware and geopolitics has ended, establishing permanently higher baseline price floors that lock mainstream consumers out of budget hardware.

## Detailed walkthrough ### [00:01](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1s) The Death of the Memory Price Cycle and the Consumer Squeeze

The DRAM and NAND flash memory manufacturers driving up the prices of SSDs, RAM, and GPUs appear to have accomplished what they have pursued for decades: suppressing the cyclical boom-and-bust nature of the memory market. Historically, the memory industry operated on swings where periods of oversupply triggered economically rock-bottom prices that heavily favored consumer builds and PC upgrades, before supply tightened and prices temporarily jumped back up. That low-price relief valve is now being systematically eliminated through long-term corporate supply agreements. Politics and memory hardware have become deeply intertwined, as government trade policy collides with semiconductor supply constraints. The impact on day-to-day retail hardware has been severe, with pricing across virtually every memory and storage category exploding:

- **2 TB NVMe SSDs:** Average price increase of 137%. - **2 TB SATA SSDs:** Average price increase of 183%. - **32 GB DDR4 Kits:** Average price increase of 294%. - **32 GB DDR5 Kits:** Average price increase of 363%. - **64 GB DDR5 Kits:** Surged roughly 483%, jumping from historic averages of $240 up to between $1,300 and $1,400.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: DRAM and NAND Supply Allocation Divergence accDescr: Flow diagram showing memory fabrication capacity being diverted away from retail consumers into hyperscaler long-term agreements.

subgraph Production["Memory Fabricators (Fabs)"] FABS["Micron, Samsung, SK Hynix, SanDisk, Kioxia"] end

subgraph Allocation["Capacity Allocation Pivot"] LTA["50%–70% Locked Under Multi-Year LTAs"] REMAIN["Diminishing Remainder"] end

subgraph Destination["End Markets"] HYPER["Hyperscalers & AI Data Centers\n(Nvidia, Amazon, Top Cloud Providers)"] CONS["Consumer & DIY Market\n(Severe Shortages, Skyrocketing Prices)"] SMB["Small Business On-Premises\n(Priced Out & Pushed to Cloud)"] end

FABS --> LTA FABS --> REMAIN LTA --> HYPER REMAIN --> CONS REMAIN --> SMB ```

For professional workstations, content creators, and small engineering firms, the pricing surge is catastrophic. In 2024, Gamers Nexus purchased a 128 GB kit of G.Skill DDR5-6400 ECC registered memory for a Threadripper review bench and production editing rig at $1,060. Today, that exact memory kit is completely absent from mainstream retail; equivalent modules from third-party resellers like Nemix command around $6,800. For high-density enterprise configurations, a 512 GB memory pool that previously commanded $4,200 now lists at an astronomical $23,811.99. Storage drives tell the exact same story: a 4 TB Samsung 990 Pro purchased for a workstation in 2024 for $390 has skyrocketed to $1,100—a 254% markup. This represents a classic "K-shaped" economic divide where retail enthusiasts, budget DIY builders, and small businesses are priced out, while hyperscalers like Nvidia absorb all high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and enterprise inventory.

---

[03:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=182s) Industry-Wide Fallout: Consoles, Smartphones, and Enterprise Cloud Lock-in

The massive diversion of DRAM and NAND silicon into AI data centers extends far beyond DIY enthusiast components; it has disrupted the pricing floor of the entire consumer electronics sector. IDC projections indicate that worldwide smartphone shipments will decline 16.7% in 2026, while the average selling price (ASP) of a smartphone will jump to $581—a 27.6% surge within a single year. Major hardware companies across every consumer vertical have been forced to initiate sweeping, multi-product price hikes:

- **Apple:** Initiated broad price hikes across its entire hardware lineup, including the MacBook Neo, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, Mac Studio, iPad, iPad Air, iPad Pro, iPad Mini, HomePod, HomePod mini, Apple TV box, and Vision Pro headset. In his final earnings call as CEO, Tim Cook characterized the crisis as a "100-year flood on the memory pricing with exponential increases in memory prices." - **Microsoft Xbox:** Announced that effective August 1, 2026, console prices will rise by $100 for 512 GB models and $150 for 1 TB models, alongside the complete sunsetting of the 2 TB model. Microsoft warned that console storage and memory costs have surged by more than 2.5 times, with projections pointing toward another doubling by autumn 2027. - **Amazon, Nintendo, & Sony:** Amazon hiked prices across its Echo Dot, Echo Show 11, Kindle, Kindle Paperwhite, Fire TV Stick HD, Fire TV Stick 4K Max, Eero 7, and Eero Pro 7 lines. Nintendo raised the MSRP floor for its Switch successor, while Sony issued two separate price increases on the PlayStation 5 within a single twelve-month window. - **Medical Equipment:** A TechInsights executive speaking to the *New York Times* warned that memory constraints stretch well beyond consumer luxuries: "Yes, the prices of your iPhone are going up, but it's also possible the prices of your MRI machine may go up, or worse than that, that MRI machine might not get made."

Simultaneously, Chinese memory fabricators have capitalized on the supply vacuum to achieve unprecedented volume growth. YMTC broke into the top three global NAND manufacturers by shipment volume, surpassing established giants Kioxia, Micron, and SanDisk. In DRAM, CXMT captured 10% of global market share by revenue, marking a six percentage point year-over-year increase according to Counterpoint Research. Yet despite producing JEDEC-standard silicon compatible with platforms like Intel, these Chinese suppliers face strict regulatory pushback and market-entry restrictions from the United States government. With historically cartelized incumbent suppliers aggressively limiting production swings, the traditional market downturn that usually rescues consumer budgets is deliberately being dismantled.

---

[06:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=366s) The Rise of Long-Term Agreements (LTAs) and Cartel-Style Allocation

The primary mechanism breaking the industry's historical boom-and-bust cycle is the rapid adoption of multi-year Long-Term Agreements (LTAs). Traditionally, memory production ran on 3-to-5-year market cycles where periods of severe oversupply forced vendors to dump excess inventory onto the retail spot market at deep discounts. Under the new LTA paradigm, major memory fabricators—Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix—are binding anywhere from 50% to 70% of their total bit allocation directly to a narrow cadre of just five to sixteen hyperscale enterprise clients, locking down factory output through 2028, 2030, and beyond. As detailed by *Chosun Daily*, LTAs are fundamentally transforming semiconductor fabrication from a volatile boom-bust dynamic into a rigid, order-based system where capacity is pre-sold years in advance.

This structural shift effectively strips away the flexibility fabricators once had to adjust to retail PC hardware demand. As JP Morgan observed, while these contracts shield hyperscale cloud providers from runaway spot costs, they severely hamstring the ability of fabs to supply consumer hardware. In practical terms, this has created a feedback loop: because cloud giants corner the supply of DRAM and flash, prices for physical on-premises servers become prohibitively expensive for small-to-medium businesses. Consequently, independent engineering outfits and small IT departments are forced to abandon bare-metal upgrades entirely and rent computing power from hyperscalers like Amazon Web Services (AWS), further concentrating demand into the cloud data center ecosystem.

Official earnings reports from the world's leading memory manufacturers make their strategic pivot unequivocal:

- **Micron:** The sole US-based memory manufacturer reported that its 16 active LTAs already command 20% of its DRAM capacity and one-third of its NAND production, with plans to put roughly half or more of all company revenue under multi-year contracts. - **SanDisk:** Recorded explosive growth in its enterprise sectors—with data center and edge revenue surging 1,298% and 392% year-over-year while consumer revenue declined by 5%—and confirmed it is committing 50% of its total bit output in 2027 and 67% in 2028 exclusively to LTAs. - **Kioxia:** Confirmed it is actively on track to hit a 50% LTA volume coverage threshold with key enterprise accounts by calendar year 2028. - **Samsung:** Disclosed that it has finalized multi-year supply contracts with the world's top five global data center operators and is actively finalizing terms with five additional major accounts. Samsung plans to dedicate 60% to 70% of its entire production capacity directly to long-term supply agreements, leaving only a fragile minority of fab allocation for non-contracted buyers.

[09:52](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=592s) Long-Term Agreements and the End of the Memory Cycle

Western Digital's CEO confirmed during an earnings report that long-term agreements (LTAs) have reached unprecedented lengths. While the company had previously secured an LTA with a major customer running through calendar year 2029, they are actively negotiating contracts spanning calendar years 2029, 2030, and even 2031. Customer visibility and appetite for these decade-spanning commitments remain exceptionally strong.

This structural transition to LTAs fundamentally alters how the memory market functions. As highlighted by *The Korea Herald*, moving away from quarterly renegotiations and short-term spot orders threatens to dampen the historical boom-and-bust cycle that has characterized the memory industry for decades. Samsung corroborated this strategy during its latest earnings call, noting that historically recurring downturns and upturns were dictated by volatility in consumer-facing markets. By shifting production capacity toward long-term, backlog-driven enterprise contracts, Samsung and its peers aim to secure corporate stability and price visibility. Industry analysts caution, however, that while LTAs reduce earnings volatility by locking in guaranteed enterprise demand, the actual durability of these agreements will only truly be tested when the broader market enters its next severe economic downturn.

[11:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=687s) Cloud Giants Monopolize Supply and Squeeze On-Premises Competitors

The overarching driver of the memory crunch is the staggering capital expenditure of cloud service providers (CSPs). TrendForce projects that total capex for the world's nine largest CSPs will surge from $922 billion in 2026 to $1.383 trillion in 2027, propelled largely by skyrocketing memory contract prices and aggressive procurement. TrendForce calculates that DRAM and NAND flash purchases alone will command 47% of cloud provider capex in 2026, expanding to a staggering 68% in 2027. In raw capital, that translates to approximately $433 billion spent solely on DRAM and NAND by these nine companies in 2026, ballooning to $940 billion in 2027.

This dynamic creates a vicious cycle that actively benefits the cloud titans at the expense of everyone else. By bidding up RAM and SSD prices to historic highs, CSPs make it prohibitively expensive for smaller, independent enterprises to upgrade their own on-premises server racks. Left with no affordable hardware alternatives, those smaller businesses are forced to abandon self-hosting and rent infrastructure directly from the very cloud providers that caused the hardware inflation.

Amazon's CEO explicitly acknowledged this phenomenon during the company's Q1 2026 earnings call, describing rising memory prices and constrained supply as "a further impetus pushing companies who have on-premises infrastructure into the cloud." He added that conversations with potential enterprise clients had accelerated rapidly because Amazon possessed "a lot more supply than what others have." Gamers Nexus calls this out as saying "the quiet part out loud"—AWS leveraged its scale to hoover up raw component supplies, locking independent businesses out of local hardware and funneling them directly into cloud subscriptions.

The financial payoffs for the hyperscalers have been immediate and massive: - **Google Cloud:** Revenue jumped 82% year-over-year. - **Microsoft Azure & Cloud Services:** Revenue climbed 43% year-over-year. - **Amazon Web Services (AWS):** Sales increased 36.7% year-over-year, marking its fastest quarterly growth rate in 18 quarters.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: The Hyperscaler Cloud Monopoly Feedback Loop accDescr: Diagram showing how cloud provider capital expenditure prices out smaller businesses and forces them into renting cloud instances. subgraph Procurement["Hyperscaler Capital Dominance"] A["Top 9 CSPs Spend Billions on Memory<br>(Capex expands to $1.383T by 2027)"] --> B["CSPs Consume Vast DRAM & NAND Supply<br>(Up to 68% of Total Capex)"] end

subgraph MarketImpact["Market Repercussions"] B --> C["Severe Component Shortages & Price Hikes"] C --> D["Smaller Enterprises Priced Out of On-Premises Hardware"] end

subgraph LockIn["Cloud Adoption"] D --> E["Enterprises Forced to Rent Instances from AWS, Azure & Google"] E --> F["Record Cloud Provider Revenue Growth<br>(AWS +36.7%, Azure +43%, Google +82%)"] F --> A end ```

[13:56](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=836s) Projected Bit Demand: Enterprise Allocation vs. Consumer Decline

Data from TrendForce underscores a wholesale structural reallocation of global silicon wafer output away from consumer electronics toward enterprise and server architectures. In NAND flash memory, server bit consumption is projected to rise from 44.2% in 2026 to 51.1% in 2027, systematically cannibalizing allocation across PCs, mobile devices, gaming consoles, and client consumer products.

DRAM exhibits an even sharper divergence because server environments strain supply on two fronts: standard high-capacity server system memory modules and High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) integrated into AI accelerators and graphics processing units. TrendForce projects DRAM bit consumption across server and enterprise graphics applications to gain 1.5 and 1.7 percentage points of total global volume, pulling output away from traditional PC, mobile, and consumer applications. By 2027, desktop and laptop PC applications are forecasted to account for a meager 5.6% of global DRAM bit demand and only 11.5% of total NAND bit demand. Compared against historical 2019 figures, server share of DRAM has grown by 13.2 percentage points, while consumer PC share has fallen by 7.1 percentage points.

[15:11](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=911s) Consumer Pricing Update: RAM, SSDs, and Hard Drives

Gamers Nexus cross-referenced PCPartPicker historical price listings between September 2025 and late 2026 to measure the direct damage inflicted on DIY builders and consumer electronics buyers. The results reveal severe inflation across all core storage and memory categories:

- **2TB NVMe SSDs:** Rose nearly $200, climbing from an average of $143.25 to $340.00. - **2TB SATA SSDs:** Shot up 183%, surging from $112.33 to nearly $318.00, compounded by manufacturers scaling back legacy SATA production lines. - **32GB DDR5-6000 CL30 Kits:** Experienced an astronomical increase of $445 (a 363% surge), leaping from $122.50 to $567.50. - **32GB DDR4 Kits:** Jumped 292%, inflating from $62.00 to $243.00. - **16TB Enterprise/Consumer Hard Drives:** Climbed roughly 129%, increasing from $350.00 in September 2025 to around $800.00, with prices escalating dramatically after April 2026.

DRAM kits experienced far steeper percentage surges than SSDs because DRAM capacity is caught in a pincer movement: manufacturers are diverting raw wafer starts simultaneously into enterprise DDR5 server DIMMs and complex HBM stacks for AI silicon, starving client consumer system memory of production capacity.

[16:55](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1015s) Spot Market Explosions and Crypto-Like Volatility

DRAMeXchange spot price trends gathered via the Wayback Machine showcase an open market displaying wild, crypto-like speculative volatility. While spot prices do not represent the bulk contracted rates negotiated by tier-one PC OEMs, they serve as a sensitive barometer for unallocated inventory and desperate open-market demand:

- **16Gb DDR5 Die:** Traded near $6.00 through mid-September 2025, jumped by roughly $20.00 between October and December, and climbed steadily to an average session spot price of $54.00 by 2026—a cumulative surge of roughly 800%. - **512Gb TLC Flash Wafers:** Held at $2.70 between July and September 2025, skyrocketed from $3.00 to $23.00 between October and March 2026, and settled near $21.00 (an increase of approximately 678%). - **16Gb DDR4 Die:** Began July 2025 at approximately $8.60, exploded upward to $78.00 between September and January, briefly dipped to $58.00 in May, and subsequently escalated to $91.00—an aggregate increase of 958%.

Steve jokes that DDR4 spot pricing resembles an altcoin chart from the 2018 cryptocurrency bubble, with the most aggressive inflection point for all memory dies occurring between October 2025 and March 2026.

[18:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1110s) The Rise of Chinese Memory and Geopolitical Realpolitik

As established suppliers abandon consumer lanes to feed high-margin hyperscalers, emerging Chinese memory fabricators are seizing substantial market share. Counterpoint Research reports that ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) expanded its global DRAM revenue share from 4% in Q2 2025 to 10% in Q2 2026. This rapid rise represents a direct commercial threat to the traditional oligopoly of Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron.

Gamers Nexus suggests this rapid commercial ascension explains why the United States government has pushed aggressively to ban Chinese competitors. Steve highlights historical precedent: during the Department of Justice's mid-2000s DRAM price-fixing cartel investigation into Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron, it was US-based Micron that cooperated with prosecutors under leniency rules ("snitches don't get stitches") to escape massive criminal fines while its South Korean rivals faced heavy penalties. Micron now stands as the primary domestic beneficiary of federal protectionist measures.

Meanwhile, Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp (YMTC) has climbed into the top three NAND manufacturers by unit shipment share, surpassing established giants Kioxia, Micron, and SanDisk/Western Digital. To circumvent Western export controls and origin restrictions, reports from *Digitimes* indicate YMTC is selling raw NAND flash dies to independent, third-party module packaging firms. These intermediary makers package the silicon into finished enterprise solid-state drives, which are then sold directly to US-based "neocloud" infrastructure providers, intentionally masking the country-of-origin trail to evade regulatory scrutiny while meeting critical storage shortages.

[20:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1228s) Geopolitical Backlash Against Chinese Memory

With global memory supplies tightening rapidly, Chinese DRAM manufacturer CXMT has reportedly begun product qualification procedures with small and midsize cloud service providers across North America, including the United States and Canada. By locking in capacity commitments well ahead of time, CXMT has attempted to secure a stable Western customer base early. However, this push into North American hardware infrastructure immediately ran into heavy political opposition. Following a Bloomberg report revealing that Apple had explored purchasing NAND and DRAM chips from CXMT and YMTC, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer reacted aggressively. As Steve Burke quips, Schumer "did what he does best and put his glasses into attack position," drafting a stern letter urging Apple to completely abandon any plans to incorporate memory from CXMT, YMTC, or any other Chinese state-backed supplier, insisting that American companies like Apple ought to buy chips stamped "Made in America."

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick voiced similar protectionist sentiments to *The Wall Street Journal*, remarking that while "there have to be other solutions to the memory issue," American tech giants relying on Chinese-manufactured memory remains an unacceptable outcome. Steve points out the glaring disconnect between Washington's rhetoric and practical industrial realities: while politicians demand American-made chips, the domestic memory manufacturing base barely exists.

[21:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1287s) Micron’s Domestic Capacity Reality and the "2035" Mirage

The demand for domestically produced memory collapses under basic scrutiny of US manufacturing figures. In late 2023, Micron's own CEO publicly acknowledged that the United States accounted for a meager 2% of total global DRAM production. Furthermore, projections from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) regarding Micron’s massive new fabrication facilities under construction in New York and Idaho suggest that US-based advanced memory manufacturing will only climb from less than 2% up to roughly 10% by the year 2035.

```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: US DRAM Share Projections vs Market Allocation accDescr: Chart showing US share of DRAM production from 2023 to 2035 and where that capacity is directed.

subgraph Capacity["Global DRAM Production Share"] A["Late 2023: US Share (~2%)"] --> B["2035 Projection: US Share (~10%)"] end

subgraph Allocation["Output Destination"] B --> C["High-Bandwidth Memory (HBM) & Enterprise AI"] B -.->|"Negligible / Shrinking Share"| D["Consumer RAM & Retail Market"] end ```

Steve ridicules the notion that consumers can simply wait out the shortage for domestic fabs to come online: "Great. That's what—it'll get better in nine years for all of us... mark your calendars for your next PC build." Even if that 10% target is realized a decade down the road, there is zero guarantee it will benefit ordinary consumers. A dominant portion of those domestic wafers will inevitably be allocated toward lucrative High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and enterprise AI accelerators rather than standard consumer desktop DRAM. Consequently, the actual percentage of consumer memory produced domestically could end up even smaller. Micron cannot supply American industry today, nor will it produce enough DRAM in 2035 to meet total demand.

As for Lutnick’s vague assertion that "there have to be other solutions," Steve mocks the lack of practical policy, joking that unless Lutnick plans to "open a fab on his allegedly dead friend's island," no magic capacity is appearing anytime soon. Restricting imports under the guise of security primarily punishes everyday consumers. Standard volatile DRAM is virtually impossible to backdoor or exploit as an attack vector, and while solid-state drives carry controller firmware, they remain verifiable. Furthermore, Burke notes the selective outrage of the "Made in America" label: the vast majority of consumer DRAM comes from South Korea (Samsung and SK Hynix), which is equally foreign-made, yet politicians fixate on arbitrary blockades that directly choke the consumer supply chain.

[24:19](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1459s) Subsidies Without Accountability: CHIPS Act vs. Free Market Allocation

The desperation among downstream technology companies has prompted intense lobbying in Washington. *The New York Times* reported that several industry groups have pushed the federal government to impose conditions on semiconductor subsidies, arguing that recipients of funding from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act should be legally mandated to supply a broader range of commercial customers rather than funneling entire wafer runs exclusively to AI hyperscalers. Other groups have even urged the administration to invoke the Defense Production Act—a Korean War-era emergency statute—to compel memory fabricators to allocate production volume outside of AI infrastructure.

In an interview with *Tom's Hardware*, Silicon Motion Senior Vice President Nelson Duann contrasted the corporate philosophies governing Chinese versus Western suppliers:

> "Because they receive government support, they also have a responsibility to help maintain the health of the local market. Foreign suppliers generally follow the highest return opportunities and can allocate most of their supply to data centers. Chinese suppliers cannot do that in the same way because the government can provide guidance and encourage them to support certain local industries."

Gamers Nexus highlights the bitter irony at play: Micron was awarded roughly $6.5 billion in direct funding under the CHIPS Act, supplemented by billions of dollars in local New York state property tax abatements—subsidies funded by taxpayers who often cannot afford local housing—yet Micron operates under zero regulatory obligations to support domestic consumers or retail PC builders. While American politicians decry Chinese companies like CXMT as unfair "state-backed" entities, Micron functions as an integral contractor within the US military supply chain and receives colossal state subsidies of its own. In practice, both sides are state-backed, but only Western taxpayers get left completely unserved by their domestic champions.

- **CHIPS Act Subsidies:** Micron received approximately $6.5 billion in federal funding plus extensive local tax breaks, yet carries no legal mandate to supply domestic consumer electronics. - **Defense Production Act:** Industry lobbyists have requested executive intervention to divert fab allocation away from exclusive AI data center contracts. - **State-Backed Equivalence:** Both foreign competitors (CXMT, YMTC) and domestic champions (Micron) rely heavily on state financing and military/national security contracts.

[26:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1581s) Divergent Forecasts: TrendForce vs. Silicon Motion on NAND and DRAM

Industry market analysts hold diverging views regarding how quickly the storage and memory drought might ease. According to projections from TrendForce, NAND flash could see an earlier recovery than DRAM. TrendForce highlights that denser layer-stacking in modern 3D NAND manufacturing, coupled with sluggish consumer device sales, is steadily nudging NAND flash toward a looser supply-demand balance:

> "Boosted by the rollout of new capacity alongside weak consumer demand... NAND flash is shifting towards a looser supply-demand structure and will face downward price adjustment pressure in the second half of the year, underscoring a clear divergence in their market cycles."

TrendForce's sufficiency ratio models forecast NAND flash supply crossing into a positive surplus—where overall bit production exceeds global demand—sometime in 2027. DRAM, by contrast, shows no such relief, with sufficiency ratios projected to deteriorate even further as server demand swallows production capacity.

However, upstream hardware manufacturers express far less optimism than market research firms. Silicon Motion SVP Nelson Duann offered a much grimmer assessment to *Tom's Hardware*, warning that the consumer storage market is being hollowed out:

> "The retail SSD market has almost disappeared. Suppliers can get some bit growth by moving to newer NAND generations, but demand is growing faster. As a result, the shortage will not improve next year. It'll get worse."

[27:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1640s) The Death of the Traditional Hardware Cycle

Reflecting on nearly two decades of covering the PC hardware space, Steve observes that the traditional separation between personal computing and high-stakes geopolitics is permanently gone. While enthusiasts could previously treat gaming rigs as detached from international diplomacy, computer hardware is now thoroughly entangled with global political maneuvering. Politicians across the globe have realized the strategic leverage of DRAM and NAND, meaning decisions to sanction companies, restrict imports, or distribute billions in state subsidies now directly dictate component prices on store shelves.

Crucially, the historic boom-and-bust cycle of memory pricing has been structurally broken. Memory manufacturers have pivoted toward massive long-term agreements (LTAs), with suppliers committing as much as 70% of their operational capacity across three- to five-year horizons. This pivot suppresses traditional cyclical volatility:

- **Elevated Price Floors:** Instead of swinging between catastrophic supplier gluts and brief price spikes, the memory market now operates within a permanently elevated, narrower pricing band. - **Absence of Relief:** When prices eventually soften, the new price floor sits substantially higher than in previous generations, locking consumers out of true budget hardware. - **Economic Catch-22:** Steve dryly notes that the only event likely to crash prices back to rock-bottom levels is a catastrophic macroeconomic bubble burst—an outcome that offers little comfort: "If the price falls in a forest and nobody has money to buy it, did the price really fall?"

Ultimately, the consumer shortage is not merely an accident of sudden AI popularity; it stems from memory manufacturers collectively recognizing their pricing power, ending the era of inexpensive multi-gigabyte memory kits, and prioritizing high-margin enterprise clients at the permanent expense of the consumer PC ecosystem.

[30:40](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1840s) Outro and Supporting Gamers Nexus Investigations

Steve wraps up the report by thanking viewers for watching and pointing them toward ways to directly support Gamers Nexus. Producing these kinds of deep-dive reports, intensive industry research, and investigative journalism requires significant time and financial resources. Viewers can visit store.gamersnexus.net to pick up merchandise or back current initiatives, such as the backer kits created for their Data Dragnet campaign—the initiative behind their extensive LG investigation video.

Steve expresses his gratitude to the community, noting that "the support so far has been phenomenal." For those looking to contribute or keep independent hardware investigations going, he directs viewers to check out the GN store or join their community on Patreon. With a quick reminder to subscribe for future reporting, Steve signs off until the next update.

- **Ways to support Gamers Nexus:** Purchasing gear and campaign kits at `store.gamersnexus.net` or backing investigations directly via Patreon (`patreon.com/gamersnexus`). - **Data Dragnet Campaign:** Community funding initiative supporting in-depth investigative pieces, such as the LG investigation project.

## Notable quotes > [03:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=182s) 100-year flood on the memory pricing with exponential increases in memory prices. — Tim Cook

> [03:02](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=182s) Yes, the prices of your iPhone are going up, but it's also possible the prices of your MRI machine may go up, or worse than that, that MRI machine might not get made. — TechInsights executive

> [11:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=687s) a further impetus pushing companies who have on-premises infrastructure into the cloud. — Amazon CEO

> [11:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=687s) a lot more supply than what others have. — Amazon CEO

> [20:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1228s) there have to be other solutions to the memory issue — Howard Lutnick

> [21:27](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1287s) Great. That's what—it'll get better in nine years for all of us... mark your calendars for your next PC build. — Steve Burke

> [24:19](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1459s) Because they receive government support, they also have a responsibility to help maintain the health of the local market. Foreign suppliers generally follow the highest return opportunities and can allocate most of their supply to data centers. Chinese suppliers cannot do that in the same way because the government can provide guidance and encourage them to support certain local industries. — Nelson Duann

> [26:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1581s) Boosted by the rollout of new capacity alongside weak consumer demand... NAND flash is shifting towards a looser supply-demand structure and will face downward price adjustment pressure in the second half of the year, underscoring a clear divergence in their market cycles. — TrendForce

> [26:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1581s) The retail SSD market has almost disappeared. Suppliers can get some bit growth by moving to newer NAND generations, but demand is growing faster. As a result, the shortage will not improve next year. It'll get worse. — Nelson Duann

> [27:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1640s) If the price falls in a forest and nobody has money to buy it, did the price really fall? — Steve Burke

> [30:40](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM&t=1840s) the support so far has been phenomenal. — Steve Burke

## Mentioned Amazon, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Apple, Apple TV, CHIPS and Science Act, Chuck Schumer, Counterpoint Research, CXMT (ChangXin Memory Technologies), DDR4, DDR5, Defense Production Act, Digitimes, DRAMeXchange, Echo Dot, Echo Show 11, Eero 7, Eero Pro 7, Fire TV Stick 4K Max, Fire TV Stick HD, G.Skill, Gamers Nexus, Google Cloud, High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), Howard Lutnick, IDC, iPad, JP Morgan, Kindle, Kindle Paperwhite, Kioxia, MacBook Air, MacBook Neo, MacBook Pro, Micron, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Xbox, Nelson Duann, Nemix, Nintendo Switch, Nvidia, PCPartPicker, PlayStation 5, Samsung, Samsung 990 Pro, SanDisk, Silicon Motion, SK Hynix, Steve Burke, Tannen Williams, TechInsights, The Korea Herald, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Tim Cook, Tim Phetdara, Tom's Hardware, TrendForce, Vision Pro, Vitalii Makhnovets, Western Digital, YMTC (Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp)

## Video description Sponsor: Thermal Grizzly Duronaut on Amazon - https://geni.us/tpgcPMw The cyclical nature of memory manufacturing may finally be broken -- and not in a good way for consumers. The memory manufacturers have all moved toward long-term agreements with longer terms and capacity than previously, with Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix diverting a flood of memory away from consumers. At the same time, Amazon has publicly stated that more users than ever will consider its cloud services due to the rising costs of on-location hardware. But don't worry: By 2035, Micron will save us all.

Watch our GPU pricing update: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vV4fow4JUMk Watch our DRAM Cartel documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVzeHTlWIDY Watch our Rise of Chinese Memory documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzfhhAfxK-A

The best way to support our work is through our store: https://store.gamersnexus.net/

Like our content? Please consider becoming our Patron to support us: http://www.patreon.com/gamersnexus

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 - RAM and SSD Prices Skyrocketing 03:02 - Affecting ALL Consumer Electronics 06:06 - Long-Term Agreements 10:18 - Manufacturers Suppressing Cyclical Pricing 11:27 - Cloud and Data Centers Driving Shortage 13:56 - Projected Demand by Application 15:11 - Price Update: SSDs and RAM 16:36 - Price Update: Hard Drives 16:55 - Price Update: Spot Price History 18:30 - Rise of Chinese Manufacturers and US Opposition 21:27 - Micron Will Save Us... in 2035 26:21 - TrendForce 2027 Supply Forecast 27:20 - Conclusion

** Please like, comment, and subscribe for more! **

Links to Amazon and Newegg are typically monetized on our channel (affiliate links) and may return a commission of sales to us from the retailer. This is unrelated to the product manufacturer. Any advertisements or sponsorships are disclosed within the video ("this video is brought to you by") and above the fold in the description. We do not ever produce paid content or "sponsored content" (meaning that the content is our idea and is not funded externally aside from whatever ad placement is in the beginning) and we do not ever charge manufacturers for coverage.

t: http://www.twitter.com/gamersnexus f: http://www.facebook.com/gamersnexus w: http://www.gamersnexus.net/

Our policies, processes, and ethics statements relating to review samples, advertising, travel, errors, and more are transparently and publicly available on this page: https://gamers.nexus/ethics-statements

Steve Burke: Host, Writing Vitalii Makhnovets: Editing Tim Phetdara: Editing Tannen Williams: Writing

[Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78y-N8URhqM)

中文简报

存储厂商重创消费级市场主持人Steve Burke报道了消费级内存与固态硬盘的灾难性涨价现象，由于晶圆产能被转供AI超大规模数据中心，32GB和64GB DDR5套条价格暴涨了数倍。随着厂商将50%至70%的晶圆厂产能通过多年期长期协议（LTA）锁定给亚马逊、微软和谷歌等云巨头，历史上存储行业固有的繁荣与萧条周期实质上已被打破，而规模较小的本地部署企业则因无力承担成本被迫转向云订阅服务。与此同时，美国对长鑫存储（CXMT）和长江存储（YMTC）等崛起的中国替代方案实施政治禁令，让西方消费者陷入困境，尤其是美光受补贴的本土扩建要到2035年才能产生有限的产能。业内分析师预测短缺将长期持续，零售货架面临清空，个人电脑硬件如今已不可避免地被卷入地缘政治博弈和价格底线的永久性通胀之中。存储制造商正通过与AI超大规模数据中心签订跨越至2028年及以后的多年期长期协议，锁定50%至70%的DRAM与NAND产能，从而压制了该行业历史上典型的繁荣与萧条周期。 (6:06) 预计排名前九的云服务提供商在2027年的资本支出将增至1.383万亿美元，其中仅DRAM和NAND存储采购就将占到总支出的68%（9400亿美元）。 (11:27) 严重的消费端通胀导致32GB DDR5套条涨价363%，2TB NVMe硬盘涨价137%，而DDR4与DDR5晶粒的公开现货市场价格涨幅更是达到了800%至958%。 (15:11) 对长鑫存储（CXMT）和长江存储（YMTC）等崛起中的中国供应商的政治打压与本土现实产生冲突，美国晶圆厂在2023年仅占全球DRAM产量的2%，预计到2035年也仅能达到10%。 (21:27)

Reading summary

Gamers Nexus reports that major memory fabricators are systematically dismantling the industry's historical boom-and-bust cycle by locking DRAM and NAND capacity into multi-year enterprise agreements. This strategic reallocation satisfies surging demand from artificial intelligence hyperscalers while starving the consumer and client PC hardware markets, driving steep price increases across retail components. Long-Term Agreements Structuralize Memory Shortages (6:06) Leading memory manufacturers—including Samsung, Micron, SK Hynix, Kioxia, and SanDisk—are fundamentally altering semiconductor distribution by shifting away from volatile spot markets toward multi-year Long-Term Agreements (LTAs). According to reporting cited from Chosun Daily and corporate earnings calls, fabricators are locking 50% to 70% of their total bit allocation into multi-year contracts with a narrow group of enterprise hyperscalers, with Western Digital negotiating agreements extending through 2029 to 2031. Historically, periods of oversupply forced fabs to offload excess inventory into retail channels at sharp discounts; the new contract structure establishes an order-driven model that eliminates excess spot volume. This structural pivot removes fabricators' operational flexibility to address consumer demand. TrendForce data indicates that by 2027, server bit consumption is projected to command 51.1% of NAND flash and the vast majority of DRAM allocation via server DIMMs and High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). Consequently, desktop and laptop personal computers are forecasted to account for only 5.6% of global DRAM bit demand and 11.5% of NAND bit demand by 2027, down significantly from 2019 levels. Hyperscaler Capex Squeezes On-Premises Competitors (11:27) Surging capital expenditure by cloud service providers (CSPs) represents the primary force absorbing global memory production. TrendForce projects that total capex for the world's nine largest CSPs will grow from $922 billion in 2026 to $1.383 trillion in 2027. DRAM and NAND flash procurement is expected to consume 47% ($433 billion) of that expenditure in 2026, rising to 68% ($940 billion) in 2027. This purchasing scale has created a feedback loop that disadvantages small-to-medium businesses attempting to maintain on-premises IT infrastructure. As hyperscalers corner memory supplies and drive up component prices, bare-metal server upgrades become financially prohibitive for independent outfits. Amazon's CEO acknowledged on an earnings call that rising memory costs and supply limitations act as an impetus pushing companies with on-premises infrastructure into the cloud, where providers like AWS hold concentrated supply. The dynamic directly bolstered cloud revenues, with quarterly sales increasing 36.7% at AWS, 43% at Microsoft Azure, and 82% at Google Cloud. Consumer Pricing Inflation and Diverging Recovery Forecasts (15:11) Retail hardware data collected via PCPartPicker from September 2025 to late 2026 demonstrates severe inflation across DIY PC components. Average prices for 2 TB NVMe SSDs rose 137% (from $143.25 to $340), 32 GB DDR4 kits surged roughly 294% (from $62 to $243), and 32 GB DDR5 kits inflated 363% (from $122.50 to $567.50). In the workstation segment, a 128 GB DDR5 ECC kit originally purchased for $1,060 rose to approximately $6,800 on third-party resale channels. The downstream fallout has impacted major consumer brands, forcing price hikes at Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Amazon, and Nintendo, while IDC projects global smartphone shipments will decline 16.7% in 2026 as average selling prices rise 27.6% to $581. Industry analysts and hardware executives offer conflicting projections regarding when supply might stabilize. TrendForce models suggest NAND flash sufficiency could flip into a modest surplus by 2027 due to advanced 3D layer-stacking and sluggish client device sales. However, Silicon Motion Senior Vice President Nelson Duann disputed this optimism in an interview with Tom's Hardware, stating that the retail consumer SSD market has almost disappeared and warning that bit demand continues to outpace growth, meaning shortages will worsen rather than improve. Geopolitics, Protectionism, and Subsidized Domestic Capacity (20:28) As Western and South Korean fabricators prioritized enterprise clients, Chinese memory manufacturers expanded into the supply vacuum. Counterpoint Research reported that CXMT reached a 10% global DRAM revenue share in Q2 2026 (up from 4% in Q2 2025), while YMTC entered the top three NAND manufacturers by shipment volume. Despite CXMT qualifying memory with North American cloud clients, the expansion provoked pushback from US officials, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who urged domestic tech firms to avoid Chinese memory in favor of American-made components. Gamers Nexus notes that this protectionist push conflicts with actual manufacturing capacity. In late 2023, Micron accounted for approximately 2% of global DRAM production, with NIST projecting that US advanced memory fabrication will only reach around 10% by 2035—capacity that will predominantly serve high-margin enterprise AI silicon rather than consumer hardware. Furthermore, while Micron received approximately $6.5 billion in CHIPS Act subsidies and substantial state property tax abatements, the legislation imposed no legal obligations on the company to supply domestic consumer or client PC markets. Gamers Nexus concludes that personal computer hardware is now permanently intertwined with macroeconomic policy and geopolitics. By locking capacity into multi-year enterprise contracts and prioritizing high-margin data centers, memory manufacturers have effectively dismantled the traditional consumer relief cycle, establishing a permanently higher pricing floor unless an acute macroeconomic crisis disrupts enterprise demand.

Source quotes

[3:02] Tim Cook: 100-year flood on the memory pricing with exponential increases in memory prices. [3:02] TechInsights executive: Yes, the prices of your iPhone are going up, but it's also possible the prices of your MRI machine may go up, or worse than that, that MRI machine might not get made. [11:27] Amazon CEO: a further impetus pushing companies who have on-premises infrastructure into the cloud. [11:27] Amazon CEO: a lot more supply than what others have. [20:28] Howard Lutnick: there have to be other solutions to the memory issue [21:27] Steve Burke: Great. That's what—it'll get better in nine years for all of us... mark your calendars for your next PC build. [24:19] Nelson Duann: Because they receive government support, they also have a responsibility to help maintain the health of the local market. Foreign suppliers generally follow the highest return opportunities and can allocate most of their supply to data centers. Chinese suppliers cannot do that in the same way because the government can provide guidance and encourage them to support certain local industries. [26:21] TrendForce: Boosted by the rollout of new capacity alongside weak consumer demand... NAND flash is shifting towards a looser supply-demand structure and will face downward price adjustment pressure in the second half of the year, underscoring a clear divergence in their market cycles. [26:21] Nelson Duann: The retail SSD market has almost disappeared. Suppliers can get some bit growth by moving to newer NAND generations, but demand is growing faster. As a result, the shortage will not improve next year. It'll get worse. [27:20] Steve Burke: If the price falls in a forest and nobody has money to buy it, did the price really fall? [30:40] Steve Burke: the support so far has been phenomenal.

Original transcript

[0:01] The DRAM and Nan flash manufacturers [0:03] responsible for the ongoing price [0:05] increases in SSDs, RAM, and GPUs have [0:08] seemingly finally figured out how to [0:10] suppress the previously decades long and [0:12] cyclical nature of their market. Where [0:14] previously you had the booms and busts [0:16] where at the low end of the pricing [0:18] cycle, it was ecomically low, really [0:20] good on the consumer side, and then it [0:23] would go up every now and then, that [0:24] seems like it's going to be gone largely [0:26] because of the long-term agreements. And [0:29] so in this video, we're going to be [0:30] breaking down a lot of really key [0:32] phrases from the suppliers, from [0:34] earnings reports, from companies in the [0:36] space, and from members of government [0:38] because now politics is completely [0:40] inseparable from the pricing that we're [0:43] seeing and the supply that we're seeing [0:45] of the memory industry. And of course, [0:47] we're looking into pricing. Since last [0:48] September, the average price of SSDs and [0:50] RAM has continued to climb. Prices have [0:52] increased by 137% for two TB NVME SSDs [0:56] on average, 183% for two TB SATA SSDs, [0:59] 363% for 32 GB DDR5 kits, and 294% for [1:03] 32 GB DDR4 kits with average prices [1:06] collected from the samples of product [1:08] listings specified below the chart. In [1:10] some situations, it's worse. DDR5 64 GB [1:13] kits have climbed from $240 on average [1:15] to $1,300 to $1,400 on average, an [1:18] increase of around $483%. If you had [1:20] dreams of a home server or a high-end [1:23] engineering design and an editing [1:24] machine with 128 GB of memory, that's [1:27] gone up even more. We bought a 128 GB [1:30] kit of DDR56400 GSkill ECC registered [1:33] memory in 2024, 2 years ago, for $1,60. [1:37] That was for an editing machine and for [1:39] a Thread Ripper review. Today, that RAM [1:41] isn't even available. If you count this [1:44] as similar from a thirdparty seller for [1:46] some good old Nemix memory, you could [1:49] get that for $6,800 [1:51] and it might even work. Or maybe you'd [1:53] prefer 512 GB, something that used to [1:55] cost $4,200 for $23,811 [2:00] and 99 because you. In 2024, we [2:05] also bought a 4 TB Samsung 990 Pro for [2:08] $390 for a work machine. Today that same [2:12] drive is 1,100 bucks or a 254% increase. [2:15] So both at the budget range of the [2:16] market like a 16 gigabyte kit or a 32 GB [2:19] kit of memory and at sort of the small [2:21] business you you've got these ideas, [2:22] these dreams of using your freshly [2:24] earned degree to do some engineering [2:26] work with a lot of small parts and some [2:28] 3D models or something like that. Both [2:31] ends of that spectrum are impacted [2:35] heavily by these prices. the people who [2:37] can take it. Nvidia, [2:40] >> no HBM for you. I need HBM. [2:43] >> So, this is the K-shaped economy. And in [2:45] this very video, we'll talk about how in [2:47] one of Amazon's own earnings reports, [2:49] it's seen an interest shift for small [2:52] businesses to move from on premises [2:54] solutions architecture to cloud-based [2:56] ones. And they're not going to stop at [2:59] the small businesses. They're coming for [3:02] everybody with that. The massive [3:03] diversion to data centers isn't just [3:05] affecting RAM and SSD prices for PC [3:07] enthusiasts and PC DIY users like us. [3:10] It's affecting the prices of all [3:12] consumer electronics for literally [3:14] everybody. According to the IDC, quote, [3:16] "Worldwide smartphone shipments will [3:17] fall 16.7% in 2026. The average selling [3:20] price of a smartphone will reach $581 in [3:23] 2026, up 27.6% in a single year." End [3:26] quote. After Apple increased prices on [3:28] its MacBook Neo, MacBook Air, MacBook [3:29] Pro, Mac Studio, iPad, iPad Air, iPad [3:32] Pro, iPad Mini, Homebot, Homebot Mini, [3:34] Apple TV Box, and Vision Pro headset, [3:36] Apple's Tim Apple noted in his final [3:39] earnings call as CEO. We reluctantly [3:42] raise prices, I would say. And we did it [3:44] because we're in uh what I would [3:46] characterize as a 100red-year flood on [3:49] the memory pricing [3:51] uh with uh exponential increases in in [3:56] memory prices. Xbox recently announced [3:58] its latest round of price increases, [4:00] stating, quote, "Effective August 1st, [4:02] 2026, we'll be updating prices [4:04] worldwide. The prices of Xbox consoles [4:05] will increase by $100 US for 512 GB [4:08] models and $150 for 1 TB models. We will [4:11] also be sunsetting our two TB model. [4:13] Unfortunately, console storage and [4:15] memory prices have increased by more [4:16] than two and a half times, and we expect [4:18] another doubling by the fall of 2027. [4:20] End quote. Amazon raised prices on its [4:22] Echo Dot, Echo Show 11, Kindle, Kindle [4:24] Paperwhite, Fire TV Stick HD, Fire TV [4:26] Stick 4K Max, Eero7, and Eero Pro 7. [4:29] Nintendo inflated its Switch to MSRP. [4:31] Sony's already increased its PS5 prices [4:33] twice within the last year. Tech Insight [4:35] Cso reported via New York Times also [4:37] added, quote, "Yes, the prices of your [4:39] iPhone are going up, but it's also [4:40] possible the prices of your MRI machine [4:42] may go up, or worse than that, that MRI [4:44] machine might not get made." End quote. [4:46] Meanwhile, Chinese newcomers CXMT and [4:48] YMTC have continued their rapid [4:50] expansions with YMTC breaking into the [4:53] top three global NAND manufacturers by [4:55] shipments, surpassing Kioxia, Micron, [4:58] and SanDisk. and CXMT now holding 10% of [5:01] the global DRAM market share by revenue [5:03] up six percentage points year-over-year [5:05] as reported by Counterpoint Research and [5:07] yet still being challenged by the United [5:09] States government for entry even though [5:11] Intel's Jedex standard memory to us the [5:14] most concerning part of all this is that [5:16] memory suppliers which have a history of [5:20] being literally a cartel actually [5:22] defined as a cartel we have a whole [5:24] documentary on it I'll link it below uh [5:27] the memory supplier buyers are finally [5:30] trying to bust the cyclical nature of [5:33] their industry and that would mean that [5:35] they want to eliminate the low point for [5:37] the prices especially for consumers. [5:39] Let's look at it before that. This video [5:41] is brought to you by Thermal Grizzly and [5:43] their new Duronaut thermal paste. [5:44] Thermal Grizzly claims its Duronaut [5:46] paste is intended for long-term [5:48] stability and endurance, focusing on [5:50] paste longevity in addition to the usual [5:52] performance focus. Thermal Grizzly's [5:54] Duronaut paste comes with applicators [5:56] and spreaders and ships in numerous tube [5:58] sizes aiming to provide a high-end paste [6:00] for PC builds and daily driven [6:02] overclocks by enthusiasts. Learn more at [6:04] the link in the description below. All [6:06] right, so long-term agreements are [6:07] really the key here today. They're [6:08] called LTAs. Long-term agreements are [6:10] made between the memory suppliers. [6:11] There's three main ones in the world [6:13] with CXMT growing and of course between [6:15] the nan flash suppliers and their [6:17] customers. The customers are not you or [6:19] me. The customers are also not companies [6:21] that sell to you or me with the small [6:24] exception of maybe Nvidia, but the part [6:27] of Nvidia's business that represents the [6:29] consumer these days is [6:32] we don't know the specific size anymore [6:33] because they've collapsed it into their [6:34] edge computing group, but it's less than [6:36] 8% of their business if you look at the [6:38] revenue numbers previously. So [snorts] [6:40] basically not consumers for these LTAs. [6:42] Now, the reason they're important is [6:44] because more recently, we've seen these [6:46] LTAs expand in the allocated capacity to [6:50] the large partners. And the term is [6:52] pretty long now. We're looking at 2030 [6:54] and later in some instances, which means [6:57] that from a consumer standpoint and [6:59] especially from an enthusiast [7:01] standpoint, there's not really an [7:03] offramp this time for when the prices [7:06] might reasonably come down a lot. Now, [7:08] maybe they come down in there, but we [7:09] don't think it'll be as much as we're [7:11] used to seeing with the cyclical version [7:13] of this. Shortages caused by AI demand [7:15] could keep supply tight just enough to [7:18] maintain the currently inflated RAM and [7:19] SSD prices for years to come. Throughout [7:21] the past year, all the major [7:22] manufacturers altered their customer [7:24] relationship strategies, now forming 3 [7:25] to 5year long-term agreements or LTAs [7:28] with their largest customers and [7:30] allocating 50 to 70% of their outputs to [7:33] only the largest five to 16 customers. [7:37] Now, contracts have been in place since [7:39] the beginning of time, but long-term [7:41] agreements are kind of special right [7:43] now, and not in a not in a good way for [7:45] us. Chosen Daily explains, quote, LTAs [7:48] are transforming the industry from a 3 [7:50] to 5year boom bust cycle into a [7:52] long-term order-based model with [7:54] pre-secured demand. End quote. So to be [7:57] clear here, the manufacturers went from [7:59] prioritizing enterprise companies over [8:02] consumers to prioritizing 10 companies [8:06] over everybody. In fact, thanks to all [8:09] the major cloud service providers and [8:10] hyperscalers buying up all the supply [8:12] and sending prices skyrocketing, smaller [8:14] businesses can no longer afford on-site [8:17] server upgrades, forcing them to rent [8:19] cloud infrastructure instead. [8:20] Fortunately for the hyperscalers, JP [8:22] Morgan notes, quote, "While LTAs may [8:25] help keep costs manageable for [8:26] hyperscalers, they dramatically decrease [8:28] the flexibility of memory fabricators to [8:30] address demand for memory chips in [8:32] consumer goods." End quote. Let's look [8:33] to each of the manufacturers's latest [8:35] earnings reports to see what they're [8:37] signaling to each other. Micron reported [8:39] that its 16 LTAs currently represent 20% [8:41] of its DRAM and a third of its NAND [8:44] supply. Micron is also the only one [8:46] based in the US. Micron said, quote, [8:48] "When completed, we expect approximately [8:50] half or more of our company revenue to [8:52] be under these SCAS, as they call them, [8:54] with customers across end markets." End [8:56] quote. SanDisk, whose data center and [8:58] edge revenue increased by 1,298% [9:02] and 392% year-over-year, while revenue [9:05] for its consumer segment decreased by 5% [9:07] year-over-year, reported that it's [9:09] allocating 50% of its bit output in 2027 [9:12] and 67% of its bit output in 2028 to [9:15] LTA. Kioxia claimed, quote, "We are on [9:18] track toward our 50% LTA volume coverage [9:20] for calendar year 28 with key [9:22] customers." End quote. Samsung stated [9:24] this. [9:25] >> We have already finalized agreements [9:26] with the top five global data center [9:30] customers are also in the final stages [9:32] of talks with five additional major [9:34] accounts to support their AI related [9:36] demands. We intended to maintain [9:38] flexibility in supply allocation and [9:41] plan to allocate approximately 60 to 70% [9:44] of our total capacity to long-term [9:46] supply agreements while preserving [9:49] sufficient capacity to support customers [9:51] without multi-year contracts. [9:52] >> Western Digital CEO affirmed [9:54] >> the last time we we reported on LTAs, we [9:57] talked about having it one LTA, a large [9:59] customer all the way up to calendar 29. [10:02] uh but we're very much in the trolls of [10:03] discussions with customers to establish [10:06] uh LTAs for calendar year 29 30 uh and [10:09] 31 as well. So visibility remains very [10:12] strong. Uh customer-driven demand for [10:14] LTAs extending all the way out to 31 [10:17] remains very strong. [10:18] >> As for the effects, these long-term [10:20] agreements will fundamentally alter the [10:21] way the memory market works for [10:23] consumers and everybody else. And the [10:26] Korea Herald explains this quote, "The [10:28] shift marks a departure from an industry [10:30] lawn dominated by quarterly negotiations [10:32] and short-term orders, potentially [10:33] softening the boom and bus cycle that [10:35] has defined the memory business for [10:37] decades." End quote. Samsung reiterated [10:39] this in its latest earnings call, [10:41] stating, [10:41] >> "Historically, the memory um industry [10:43] has experienced recurring cycles of [10:45] upturns and downturns um driven by [10:48] demand fluctuations in consumer oriented [10:51] applications. However, by uh [10:53] increasingly increasing the share of [10:57] longerterm uh backlog driven business, [11:01] uh we hope to significantly enhance the [11:04] stability and visibility of our [11:06] business. [11:06] >> And Samsung's not alone. All [11:07] manufacturers are echoing the same [11:09] enhanced visibility phrase in some [11:12] manner or another. One industry analyst [11:14] reported via the Korea Herald asserted, [11:16] quote, LTAs are unlikely to eliminate [11:18] the memory cycle, but they could reduce [11:20] earnings volatility by locking in demand [11:22] for longer periods. How effective they [11:24] are will depend on how the contracts [11:25] hold up in the next downturn. End quote. [11:27] But this shortage is really driven by [11:29] cloud providers. And amidst the height [11:32] of that shortage, I guess the demand has [11:35] continued to increase. Trend Force [11:37] anticipates capex for the world's nine [11:39] major CSPs to increase from $922 billion [11:42] in 2026 to$ 1.383 trillion dollars in [11:46] 2027 explaining quote the rapid increase [11:49] will be driven in part by soaring memory [11:51] contract prices and robust procurement [11:53] demand. Trendforce estimates that DRAM [11:56] and NAND flash combined will account for [11:58] 47% of cloud service providers total [12:01] capex in 2026 with their share rising [12:03] further to 68% in 2027. End quote. Based [12:08] on Trend Forc's figures that put the [12:10] nine largest CSPs capex spending on only [12:13] DRAM and NAND at an estimated $433 [12:17] billion in 2026 and an estimated $940 [12:21] billion in 2027. Luckily for the CSPs, [12:25] after driving up RAM and SSD prices, [12:28] smaller businesses couldn't afford [12:29] on-site server upgrades, forcing them to [12:32] rent cloud infrastructure from those [12:34] very CSPs that just drove up the prices. [12:36] Amazon CEO described this new dynamic in [12:39] its first quarter 26 earnings report, [12:41] explaining, quote, "One of the [12:43] interesting things that we see right now [12:44] with the change in price and supply on [12:46] things like memory is that it's a [12:48] further impetus pushing companies who [12:50] have on premises infrastructure into the [12:53] cloud." End quote. They also said, [12:54] quote, "We have seen a number of [12:56] conversations we've been having with [12:57] enterprises for many months accelerate [12:59] rapidly just because we have a lot more [13:02] supply than what others have. It'll be [13:04] interesting to see how that evolves over [13:05] time." end quote. That's it. [13:08] That's the quiet part out loud. That's [13:11] Amazon, the owners of AWS, one of the [13:14] largest data center and cloud solution [13:17] infrastructure providers in the world, [13:19] saying that it has played a part in both [13:23] pushing smaller businesses out of being [13:26] able to afford their own on-site [13:28] solution and pushing them into renting [13:32] it from Amazon instead. That's not going [13:34] to stop at the small companies. The CSPs [13:37] are already seeing the results. In their [13:39] latest filings, Google's cloud revenue [13:41] increased 82% year-over-year. [13:43] Microsoft's category called Azure and [13:45] other cloud services revenue increased [13:47] 43% year-over-year. And AWS sales [13:50] increased 36.7% year-over-year, which [13:53] Amazon notes is its quote fastest growth [13:55] in 18 quarters. End quote. For further [13:57] reference and trend forc's forecast [13:59] breakdown of NAND flash bit demand by [14:01] end application 26 to 2027 chart the [14:04] firm projects NAND bit demand for server [14:06] applications to increase from 44.2% in [14:08] 2026 to 51.1% in 2027 while percent of [14:12] total bit demand for PC, mobile, game, [14:15] console, and other applications will [14:17] each moderately decrease. In comparison, [14:20] Trend Force expects DRAM's bit demand [14:22] from graphic and server applications to [14:24] increase by 1.7 and 1.5 percentage [14:27] points, reallocating percent of total [14:29] bit demand away from PC, mobile, and [14:32] consumer applications. While NAND is [14:34] primarily only affected by increased [14:36] server consumption, DRAM is heavily [14:38] affected by increased graphics [14:40] consumption in addition to increased [14:42] server consumption as manufacturers [14:44] prioritize HPM. Based on Trend Force's [14:47] projections, PC applications will [14:49] account for 5.6% of DRAM bit demand and [14:52] 11.5% of NAND bit demand in 2027. [14:55] Compared to Trend Force's 2019 numbers, [14:57] the percent of total DRM consumption for [14:59] server applications is projected to [15:01] increase by 13.2 percentage points and [15:03] projected to decrease by 7.1 percentage [15:06] points for PC applications. As for how [15:08] this affects the consumer market, I [15:10] think we all know this chart compares [15:12] average prices from September 2025 to [15:14] average prices currently. We collected [15:16] each entry's average prices from a [15:18] sample of individual product listings [15:20] that we found complete price histories [15:22] for on PC Part B picker as we specify [15:24] below the chart based on our samples. [15:26] And since last September, average prices [15:28] for two TB NVME SSDs increased by nearly [15:31] $200 from $14325 [15:35] to $340. Average prices for two TB SATA [15:38] SSDs shot up 183% from $112.33 [15:42] to almost $318. [15:44] This is likely aided in some capacity by [15:47] less production of SATA SSDs. Average [15:49] prices for 32 GB DDR5 6000 CL30 kits [15:53] skyrocketed by an insane $445 [15:56] or 363% increasing from 122 1.5 bucks to [16:00] 567 1.5 bucks. Finally, average prices [16:04] for 32 GB DDR4 kits surged from $62 to [16:08] $243 currently or by $292%. While all [16:12] prices increased significantly within [16:14] the last year, RAM appears to have [16:16] undergone steeper percent increases. [16:18] Part of this we'd assume is because [16:19] unlike NAND supply, which is primarily [16:21] reallocated to server applications, DRAM [16:23] supply is getting hit on both ends, [16:25] reallocating supply to both server [16:27] applications for use with the CPU [16:29] components and HBM for graphics cards [16:32] and accelerators. Of course, still [16:34] server and enterprise applications, but [16:35] you get both sides of it. For additional [16:37] comparison, PC Part Picker's price [16:39] trends chart for a 16 TBTE hard drive [16:41] illustrates how its average price [16:43] increased by nearly 129% in the same [16:46] period from roughly $350 in September [16:48] 2025 to around $800 currently, with [16:52] price increases really beginning to [16:53] accelerate in April 2026. We'll take a [16:56] look at spot prices next. While spot [16:58] prices aren't representative of the [16:59] contract prices most major OEMs actually [17:02] pay, they are indicative of demand. This [17:05] chart plots the spot price session [17:07] averages for 16 gigbit DDR5, 512 GB TLC [17:11] wafer, and 16 Gbit DDR4, which we [17:14] collected from saved DRAM exchange web [17:16] pages accessed via archive.org's wayback [17:19] machine. The 16 GB DDR5 session average [17:21] started around $6 between July and [17:24] midepptember, jumped by about $20 [17:26] between October and December, and has [17:29] gradually increased to its current $54 [17:32] session average since January. The 512 [17:35] DLC wafer session average held around [17:37] $2.70 between July and September, surged [17:40] from $3 to $23 between October and [17:43] March, and has plateaued around $21 [17:45] since. The 16 gigabyte DDR4 session [17:48] average began at around $8.60 in July, [17:51] skyrocketed to $78 between September and [17:55] January, dropped to $58 in May, and has [17:59] continued a steady climb since, sitting [18:01] around $91 currently. It's basically [18:03] behaving like the crypto market. If DDR4 [18:08] spot pricing were an altcoin, it'd fit [18:10] right in with 2018. Compared to each [18:13] entry session average in July, current [18:15] spot prices have increased by roughly [18:17] 800% for 16 gigabit DDR5, 678% for 512 [18:22] Gbit TLC, and 958% for 16 Gbit DR4, with [18:28] greatest increases occurring between [18:29] October and March. Meanwhile, emerging [18:32] Chinese manufacturers CXMT and YMTC are [18:36] gaining on the incumbents. According to [18:37] Counterpoint Research, CXMT's global DRM [18:40] market share by revenue has increased [18:42] from 4% in second quarter 25 to 10% in [18:46] second quarter 26. Now, this should be [18:48] terrifying for incumbents because that [18:49] is a rapid gain for these companies and [18:51] maybe explains why the United States [18:53] government is so eager to ban them in [18:56] the US. Micron is trying to scoop up [18:59] more business. Micron is US-based. If [19:02] you look back at the history of these [19:03] companies when it was just SKHEX and [19:06] Samsung [19:08] and Micron, a couple smaller partners in [19:11] there too, but it was those three [19:12] companies really. So, two Korean [19:14] companies and Micron in the US. Guess [19:17] which company got some form of snitches [19:20] don't get stitches when the DOJ brought [19:24] charges for being a cartel? [19:28] I'll give you I'll give you a moment. [19:29] It's not It's not the ones from Korea. [19:31] It's the one from the United States. So, [19:34] it it does seem like that play is in [19:37] session. Again, if you're curious about [19:39] CXMT and YMTC for a deeper dive, we have [19:42] a full documentary on them. It's [19:43] actually it's one of my favorite pieces [19:44] we worked on in the past year. It's [19:46] called The Rise of Chinese Memory. We [19:47] dive into their history. Very [19:49] interesting stuff. But anyway, [19:51] Counterpoint also claimed that YMTC [19:54] recently broke into the top three [19:55] largest NAND manufacturers by shipment [19:57] share, now surpassing Kioxia, Micron, [20:00] and SanDisk. In fact, the China based [20:02] manufacturers are now reportedly looking [20:04] to expand their market share outside of [20:06] China. Juken citing Digit Times reports [20:09] quote as part of this strategy YMTC is [20:11] reportedly selling NAND chips to [20:13] independent thirdparty module makers [20:15] which then assemble them into finished [20:16] enterprise solidstate drives for [20:18] customers such as US Neocloud providers. [20:21] This indirect route is intended to avoid [20:23] sensitivities surrounding the products [20:25] country of origin. With DDR5 and LP DDR5 [20:28] supplies becoming increasingly tight, [20:30] CXMT has reportedly begun product [20:32] qualification with small and midsize [20:34] cloud service providers in markets [20:36] including the US and Canada. The company [20:38] appears to be seeking secure customers [20:40] early by locking in capacity commitments [20:43] ahead of time. End quote. That said, [20:45] after Bloomberg reported that Apple was [20:48] attempting to purchase chips from CXMT [20:50] and YMTC, Chuck Schumer did what he does [20:52] best and put his glasses into attack [20:55] position and wrote a very strongly [20:58] worded letter stating and urging Apple [21:00] quote to abandon any effort to [21:02] incorporate memory from CXMT, YMTC, or [21:06] any other Chinese statebacked supplier [21:08] into any of its products end quote and [21:11] claiming quote American companies like [21:13] Apple should be buying chips stamped [21:16] made in America. End quote. The Wall [21:18] Street Journal also quoted Commerce [21:19] Secretary Lutnik as saying, quote, [21:21] "There have to be other solutions to the [21:23] memory issue, but it's not great [21:25] American companies using Chinese [21:26] memory." End quote. For context, in late [21:28] 2023, Micron's own CEO acknowledged [21:32] this. [21:32] >> Today, only 2% of the world's total [21:36] memory production, DM production, [21:39] [music] is coming from the US. [21:41] >> 2% [21:45] 2% of the memory supply from the United [21:48] States at least in late 2023. [21:50] Additionally, the National Institute of [21:52] Standards and Technology notes that [21:54] microns at New York and Idaho fabs [21:56] currently in construction quote will [21:58] help the US grow its share of advanced [22:00] memory manufacturing from less than 2% [22:02] today to approximately 10% by 2035. End [22:06] quote. Great. [22:09] That's that's what it'll get better in [22:12] uh nine years for all of us. Maybe [22:17] there's a lot of assumptions in there [22:18] like nobody else does anything. They all [22:20] just wait for Micron to you know [22:24] mark your calendars for your next PC [22:27] build. I would expect a significant [22:29] portion of the chips Micron eventually [22:31] manufactures in the US won't even end up [22:33] in consumer products. probably go to HBM [22:36] or whatever replaces it, making the [22:38] percent of DRM available to consumers [22:40] likely even less. In other words, the [22:42] only American manufacturer for memory, [22:45] Micron, doesn't produce enough memory in [22:48] America to support American companies [22:51] today. Nor will it produce enough DRAM [22:53] in America in 2035 to support companies [22:57] then. And yet somehow [23:03] Lutnik says there needs to be some other [23:06] solution. We don't know what other [23:09] solution that could be at this unless he [23:12] wants to like open a fab on his [23:14] allegedly dead friend's island. Maybe [23:16] that would help. I don't know. Maybe add [23:18] another 2% or something. Uh but this [23:21] there's a lot there's a lot of I I'm [23:23] going to stop talking now. [snorts] [23:27] Restricting imports now [23:30] will only harm consumers and citizens. [23:35] And you from a security standpoint too, [23:37] these things are verifiable. [23:40] Memory is an unlikely candidate for [23:42] vulnerabilities. From what we [23:43] understand, SSD is maybe a little [23:45] different, still can be verified, but we [23:47] discussed that in a rise of Chinese [23:49] memory documentary. But the greater [23:50] point is it's not about the [23:52] manufacturers from China. It's about [23:54] this concept that the politicians are [23:56] pushing, including Chuck Schumer, of a [24:00] made in America stamp. Like the stuff [24:02] that's made in Korea is also not made in [24:04] America, and the industry relies on it. [24:08] How aggressive do we want to get with [24:11] the blockades of what's [24:14] coming in to supply the memory market? [24:17] So, that's not made here either. Anyway, [24:19] the New York Times speaking with [24:20] lobbyists asking for government [24:22] intervention reported, quote, "Some have [24:24] suggested that selling chips to a [24:26] broader set of customers should be a [24:28] condition for receiving money from the [24:30] 2022 Chips and Science Act, a program to [24:33] fund semiconductor research and [24:35] manufacturing in the United States. [24:36] Others have asked the Trump [24:37] administration to use a Korean War era [24:40] law called the Defense Production Act to [24:42] require allocation to industries outside [24:44] of AI. End quote. In an interview with [24:47] Tom's Hardware, Silicon Motion SVP [24:49] Nelson Dwan noted about China's [24:50] manufacturers, quote, "because they [24:52] receive government support. They also [24:54] have a responsibility to help maintain [24:56] the health of the local market. Foreign [24:58] suppliers generally follow the highest [25:00] return opportunities and can allocate [25:02] most of their supply to data centers. [25:04] Chinese suppliers cannot do that in the [25:06] same way because the government can [25:08] provide guidance and encourage them to [25:10] support certain local industries." End [25:12] quote. Now, we do think it's ironic that [25:14] despite Micron receiving nearly 6 and a [25:18] half billion dollars from the CHIPS act [25:21] and receiving government subsidies that [25:24] give it billions of dollars in tax [25:27] breaks on things like property taxes in [25:29] New York, where normal people can't [25:31] afford property. [25:33] Micron seemingly has no responsibilities [25:36] to actually support domestic markets or [25:39] opportunities or especially people the [25:43] ones that really matter the most here [25:45] and Micron 2 is part of the US [25:48] military's supply and so the sort of [25:51] accusation of oh but CXMT and [25:54] statebacked funding they're all [25:56] statebacked all of them they all get [25:58] state money from somewhere for something [26:01] so it kind of falls flat [26:03] And for the rest of us, [26:06] none of this helps anyway. It doesn't [26:08] change the fact if we're saying, look, [26:11] we can go from 2% to 10% of global [26:13] supply in 10 years, and probably most of [26:17] that's for data centers anyway, that [26:19] doesn't help me or you. It's not a [26:21] solution. As for the forecast supply [26:23] demand going forward, trend force [26:25] predicts we may see a light at the end [26:26] of the tunnel for NAND sooner than DRAM [26:28] citing a greater output due to denser [26:30] layer NAND technology stating quote [26:33] boosted by the rollout of new capacity [26:34] alongside weak consumer demand. Wonder [26:36] why that could be. NAND flash is [26:38] shifting towards a looser supply demand [26:40] structure and will face downward price [26:42] adjustment pressure in the second half [26:44] of the year underscoring a clear [26:45] divergence in their market cycles. End [26:47] quote. In its DAM and NAND flash [26:49] sufficiency ratios chart, Trend Force [26:51] anticipates NANDFL flash reaching a [26:53] positive sufficiency ratio where supply [26:55] exceeds demand sometime in 2027, while [26:58] DRAM sufficiency ratio is only expected [27:00] to get worse. That said, not all [27:02] industries share the same optimism. In [27:05] an interview with Tom's Hardware, a [27:06] Silicon Motion SVP asserted, quote, "The [27:08] retail SSD market has almost [27:10] disappeared. Suppliers can get some bit [27:12] growth by moving to newer NAND [27:14] generations, but demand is growing [27:15] faster. As a result, the shortage will [27:17] not improve next year. It'll get worse." [27:19] End quote. All right. So, conclusions. [27:22] Memory is getting very deep into future [27:24] geopolitics at this point. They are [27:26] inseparable. So, like the old days of [27:29] you can kind of separate politics and [27:31] your gaming computer. That is done. [27:34] And it's been done for a while. It might [27:36] have even been done back then, but maybe [27:38] I hadn't grown up enough yet to [27:39] recognize it. But right now, I'm telling [27:41] that that's over. like they are [27:43] intertwined in ways that are pretty [27:45] disgusting. Um whether I was naive back [27:48] then or not, we could talk about that [27:49] another that's a different discussion. [27:51] But certainly today from my perspective [27:55] personally, uh politics is deeply [27:58] intertwined with the computer chip [28:00] industry and computer hardware. And I I [28:02] do actually think that has substantially [28:04] changed over the last several years in [28:06] particular as suddenly every politician [28:09] on the planet seems to know the word [28:11] memory and understands that it can mean [28:14] computer parts where previously I don't [28:15] know that that would have been the case. [28:16] So it does seem to have certainly [28:18] changed and uh those political decisions [28:21] to ban or unban or dole out money to [28:24] whoever's deserving and for whatever [28:26] purpose that drives the pricing now and [28:28] that includes for consumer and it is not [28:30] separable. We do think that the move to [28:32] higher capacity and longer duration [28:33] long-term agreements will fundamentally [28:36] alter the market's traditionally [28:37] cyclical pricing. something that I've [28:40] personally been in the industry long [28:41] enough now was around 18 years or so to [28:43] witness it a few times in that cycle and [28:46] uh my guess is that this likely reduces [28:49] overall pricing volatility and not in a [28:51] good way meaning the floor doesn't come [28:53] down as low and so the floor is [28:56] elevated, the ceiling's elevated um but [28:59] you're operating in a narrower higher [29:01] band than previously. So for consumers [29:05] that means higher floor pricing and when [29:07] it comes down it's not as low as it used [29:09] to be. Maybe with the exception of a [29:10] bubble pop which is probably the best [29:12] thing you can hope for except that also [29:13] destroys the economy. So I don't know. [29:16] It's like can you afford memory anyway? [29:18] It's if the the price falls in a forest [29:21] and nobody has money to buy it did the [29:23] price really fall? I don't know. Guess [29:25] we'll find out. But currently we have no [29:28] unique insight here for the future of [29:30] this. Uh but if manufacturers are [29:32] allocating up to 70% of their capacities [29:35] 5 years in advance, that seems awfully [29:37] bad for the rest of us and we'd assume [29:39] the supply will remain constrained until [29:41] the manufacturers are able to [29:42] meaningfully increase the capacity or [29:45] maybe there's some kind of regulation [29:46] that forces something else. But um going [29:48] forward, we're going to continue keeping [29:50] an eye on the pricing and uh update you [29:52] all on meaningful market changes. We're [29:54] also going to try to continue to provide [29:56] the insight beyond just the prices on [29:57] the websites. I mean that to me that's [29:59] kind of the number one thing I still [30:00] care about for this stuff. But you look [30:02] into the background of why this is [30:04] happening. I think that's just as [30:05] important and maybe more these days [30:08] because the why it's happening is it's [30:11] not for reasons that it used to be. So [30:15] um I mean at the core of it it's still [30:17] greed and cartels and collusion I guess [30:19] in my opinion but um but there are more [30:22] external pressures and factors now and I [30:25] think more entities that suddenly are [30:27] interested in this market where it seems [30:29] like suddenly all at once everyone [30:31] around the world said wait a minute [30:34] we're charging what for 32 gigabytes why [30:38] why are we giving it away? That's it for [30:40] this one. Thanks for watching. You can [30:42] go to store.gamersac.net To support us [30:44] directly as we dive into topics like [30:46] this and perform in-depth research and [30:48] investigations, you can grab one of our [30:50] backer kits currently out there for our [30:52] data drag net campaign under which we [30:55] launched our LG investigation video. We [30:57] need your help to do more of those and [30:58] the support so far has been phenomenal. [31:00] So, thank you. And that's on the store [31:02] if you want to help out there or [31:04] patreon.com/gamersac. [31:06] Subscribe for more. We'll see you all [31:07] next time.