Daily newsletter · Tue 13 Oct 2026
A Chinese memory maker showed off a denser chip, and SanDisk fell 5.97%
SanDisk fell 5.97% to US$1,487.33 on Monday. Micron, America's biggest memory maker, lost 3.88% to US$989.04.
The trouble started at a conference in Shanghai. Over the weekend Cao Kanyu, president of ChangXin Memory Technologies, said CXMT will launch a new server memory product before the end of 2026. It uses a denser design that fits more memory cells onto each chip.
In today's mainstream memory chips, each cell takes up six small squares of silicon. CXMT's design needs four, so the same slice of silicon holds more memory.
That matters because memory has been extraordinarily profitable. Micron had risen 261% this year to Friday's close, as AI data centres bought everything the industry could make.
CXMT is already big. Its shares jumped 466% on their Shanghai debut in July, which made it the most valuable listed company in China.
CXMT has promised the chip by the end of 2026, and buyers will judge it on how many working chips it makes. Our read is that memory prices depend on tight supply, and Monday was the first time a Chinese rival looked able to loosen it.
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All stories →- Wednesday 4 November AMD's data centre sales nearly doubled, and it has guided to US$17 billion for this quarter
- Friday 23 October Lam Research fell 11.76% after saying it could not get enough parts, and chip stocks followed
- Friday 16 October TSMC made a record profit and raised its sights, and its shares still fell 1.8%
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