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Economics 201: RAM Prices for Dummies 💊 RED PILL 💊
posted ago by penisse ago by penisse +148 / -0

👉🏻 https://x.com/ric_rtp/status/2023749984697356425

👉🏻 https://nitter.net/ric_rtp/status/2023749984697356425

AI companies just BROKE the global supply chain for every piece of technology you own.

And the fallout is way worse than anyone predicted...

Sony is delaying the next PlayStation to 2028 or 2029.

Nintendo is hiking the Switch 2 price mid-cycle.

Apple warned investors that iPhone margins are getting crushed.

Cisco just posted its worst share loss in 4 years.

Oppo is cutting phone shipments by 20%.

Lenovo, Dell, HP, Acer, and ASUS are all raising laptop prices 15-20%.

Samsung is now reviewing memory contracts QUARTERLY instead of annually because prices change too fast to plan.

And Elon Musk just told investors Tesla has to build its own chip factory from scratch because no supplier on the planet can keep up.

His exact words: "We've got two choices: hit the chip wall or make a fab."

All of this happened in the last 3 weeks.

Same cause. Every single time.

AI data centers are buying every memory chip on Earth.

And there's nothing left for everyone else.

Here's how we got here:

3 years ago, ChatGPT launched and the AI arms race began.

Since then, Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron, the only 3 companies that make memory chips, quietly made a decision that's now reshaping the ENTIRE global economy.

They stopped prioritizing consumer memory.

Every factory. Every production line. Every wafer. All redirected toward one customer: AI data centers

Why?

Money.

AI memory chips sell for 3-5X the margin of regular RAM.

When Google calls offering to buy your entire output at premium pricing, you don't say no.

So the 3 companies that control 90% of the world's memory supply chose their highest-paying customers and left everyone else fighting over scraps.

The numbers from this week are insane:

OpenAI's Stargate project ALONE will consume 40% of the entire world's DRAM output.

HBM demand is surging 70% year over year in 2026.

HBM now takes 23% of total DRAM wafer production, up from 19% last year.

Meanwhile, there's a 4% gap between global DRAM supply and demand. And that doesn't even account for depleted inventories across multiple industries.

DRAM prices have surged over 170% since early 2025.

DDR5 contract prices are still jumping double digits month over month.

And the memory makers? They're printing money.

Micron's revenue is expected to more than DOUBLE this fiscal year.

SK Hynix sales doubled in 2024 and are on pace to double AGAIN.

Samsung just reported quarterly profit nearly tripling.

3 companies. $650 billion in AI spending chasing their products. And they get to name their price.

But the collateral damage is everywhere:

Every industry that uses memory, which is every industry, is getting squeezed.

Smartphone manufacturers are getting destroyed. For a mid-range phone, memory now represents up to 30% of the total build cost. Triple what it was in early 2025.

Chinese phone makers like Xiaomi, Oppo, and Transsion are cutting shipment forecasts and raising prices because they literally cannot afford the memory to build their phones.

Lenovo's CFO called the cost surge "unprecedented" and admitted they stockpiled 50% more inventory than normal just to survive the next few months.

The PC market could shrink by up to 9% this year according to IDC.

Not because people don't want computers. But because they can't afford the memory that goes inside them.

And the gaming industry?

Sony is seriously considering pushing the next PlayStation to 2028 or 2029.

Their carefully planned console cycle is getting blown up because they can't secure memory at prices that make a new console viable.

Nintendo is looking at raising the Switch 2 price. In the middle of a launch cycle. Something console makers almost never do.

Nvidia is cutting RTX GPU production because they can't get enough GDDR7 memory.

Even the car industry is getting hit...

Analysts are warning about a repeat of the pandemic-era chip shortage that shut down auto factories worldwide.

All because AI companies decided their chatbots needed the memory more than your car does.

And this doesn't get better for YEARS.

Building a new memory fab takes 3-5 years minimum.

Micron's new factory in Idaho won't meaningfully increase supply until 2027 at the earliest.

By then, AI demand will have grown even more.

Memory makers are already selling their 2027 AND 2028 capacity to AI customers today.

There is no supply relief coming.

That's why Elon is planning to build Tesla's own "TeraFab," a massive semiconductor plant that makes logic chips, memory, AND packaging all under one roof.

He said existing suppliers including TSMC, Samsung, and Micron simply cannot supply Tesla at the levels the company needs.

Think about that.

One of the richest men in the world, running one of the largest companies on Earth, can't buy enough memory chips. So he's building his own factory.

If ELON can't get supply, what chance does everyone else have?

The AI revolution has a tax.

And YOU'RE paying it.

Every dollar Big Tech spends on AI infrastructure drives up the cost of the memory inside your phone, your laptop, your car, your TV, and your gaming console.

$650 billion in AI spending this year.

3 companies controlling 90% of the memory supply.

And every wafer they allocate to an Nvidia GPU is a wafer denied to the device in your pocket.

The AI boom isn't free.

You're subsidizing it every time you buy a piece of technology.

And the bill just went up like crazy.

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