Wiki/Supply
Capex discipline at the Big 3
The central claim the memory industry has been making to its shareholders, repeatedly and on the record, since 2022: we are not going to outrun demand the way we did in 1996, 2008, 2018, or 2022.
This page collects the verbatim quotes and the matching capex numbers.
Mehrotra (Micron) — "structural, not cyclical"
CEO Sanjay Mehrotra has repeated a tight phrase across the last four earnings cycles:
- Q4 FY25 prepared remarks (Sept 2025): "Data center mix expansion looks structural, not cyclical." (primary PDF)
- Q1 FY26 prepared remarks (Dec 17, 2025): "AI has not just increased demand for memory; it has fundamentally recast memory as a defining strategic asset in the AI era." (primary PDF)
- Q2 FY26 prepared remarks (March 2026): Memory's role "fundamentally altered... from a system component to a strategic asset." (primary PDF)
- Q4 FY25 — explicit discipline framing: "Micron is remaining disciplined on CapEx growth to support bit demand and bit supply, with supply aligned to demand."
The framing matters because it justifies why Micron is not adding speculative wafers: the demand is structural, but the supply response remains demand-matched.
SK Hynix — "investment with capex discipline"
- Q1 2026 earnings call: "Our policy is to execute investment with CapEx discipline, taking demand visibility into account... While adhering to CapEx discipline, [we] will execute investments based on demand visibility, thereby ensuring both supply stability and financial soundness." (SK Hynix Q1 2026 results page; CNBC coverage.)
- Kim Woo-hyun, CFO, Q4 2022 (Oct 2022): announced ~50% cut in consolidated investment from the prior year's 19 trillion KRW. (The Investor; SK Hynix Q1 2023 results.) This is the originating event for the modern discipline doctrine.
- Kim Jae-joon, current CFO: "We have already sold out our entire 2026 HBM supply." (Cited via SemiAnalysis.)
The capex numbers — discipline, not absence
| Producer | Year | Capex | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Micron | FY25 (actual) | $13.8B | |
| Micron | FY26 (guidance, Dec 2025) | $20B, raised from $18B | "Primarily supporting HBM supply capability and 1-gamma supply" |
| SK Hynix | 2022 | ~19 trillion KRW | Peak |
| SK Hynix | 2023 | ~6–7 trillion KRW | ~50% cut |
| SK Hynix | 2024 | +90% YoY but still below 2022 peak | |
| SK Hynix | 2025 (est.) | ~$13–14B | Stifel estimate; company declined to publish number |
| Samsung | 2024 | KRW 48T total semiconductor capex | Memory portion not broken out |
Sources: Micron Q4 FY25 / Q1 FY26 transcripts; TrendForce Dec 18, 2025; Investing.com — Stifel on Hynix; TrendForce July 24, 2025.
Micron's $20B FY26 is the largest single-year capex in its history. SK Hynix's 2024 figure was a 90% rebound — but still under the 2022 peak. This is the shape of the discipline argument: capex is rising into a demand surge but is allocated almost entirely to HBM assembly, TSV, and 1-gamma node migration — not to building new commodity DRAM wafer capacity that would relieve the squeeze on PCs, phones, and cars.
The 2022–2023 wafer-start cuts (the precedent the discipline rests on)
- Samsung — April 7, 2023: Announced "meaningful" memory production cut in Q1 prelim guidance. Daishin and KB Securities estimated cuts of ~25% H1 2023 vs. H1 2022. (Korea Herald; Tom's Hardware.) First explicit Samsung output-cut admission in years. The landmark capitulation.
- SK Hynix — Oct 2022 → expanded H2 2023: "Double-digit" DRAM shipment volume reduction. (SK Hynix Q1 2023 results; Digitimes.)
- Micron — Nov 16, 2022: FY23 capex cut ~30% to ~$8B, DRAM/NAND wafer starts cut ~20%. Mehrotra on FQ1 FY23 call: "front-end wafer starts reduced approximately 20% across DRAM and NAND."
These were costly cuts (Micron lost $5.83B in FY23, its largest annual loss ever; SK Hynix lost KRW 7.7T over 2023; Samsung's Semiconductor division lost KRW ~14.9T in 2023). The point of the current "discipline" framing is that they did the cut, took the losses, and survived — and they are not going to spend the capital they freed up on speculative wafers.
Why this is the load-bearing piece
If you believe AI demand for HBM is durable, capex discipline is just a margin story. If you believe AI demand for HBM is fragile, capex discipline is the reason the producers are protected — and the reason the loss, when it lands, will land somewhere downstream of them.
See structure/who-eats-the-loss.md for the full risk-allocation walkthrough.