# SK Hynix Completes $26.5B IPO, Largest Foreign Listing in U.S. History

> SK Hynix just pulled off the largest foreign IPO in U.S. history, raising $26.5 billion at $149 per American depositary receipt and edging past the record Alibaba set back in 2014. The listing is a milestone for a company most people outside the industry have never heard of, yet whose chips sit at the center of the AI boom. The reason is high-bandwidth memory, or HBM, the specialized stacks of DRAM that feed data to AI accelerators fast enough to keep them busy. SK Hynix controls roughly 60% of global HBM supply and reports a remarkable 72% operating margin on those chips, the highest profitability in the semiconductor sector. The huh factor here is where the money in AI actually pools. While attention fixates on model labs burning cash, a memory maker quietly became one of the most profitable and strategically vital firms in the chain. Proceeds will fund a new Korean fab and more advanced EUV capacity, deepening its grip on a scarce resource.

_Section: [Daily AI Updates](https://www.wortins.com/daily-ai) · Source: TechCrunch · Published Monday, July 13, 2026_

## Wortins' read

SK Hynix just pulled off the largest foreign IPO in U.S. history, raising $26.5 billion at $149 per American depositary receipt and edging past the record Alibaba set back in 2014. The listing is a milestone for a company most people outside the industry have never heard of, yet whose chips sit at the center of the AI boom. The reason is high-bandwidth memory, or HBM, the specialized stacks of DRAM that feed data to AI accelerators fast enough to keep them busy. SK Hynix controls roughly 60% of global HBM supply and reports a remarkable 72% operating margin on those chips, the highest profitability in the semiconductor sector. The huh factor here is where the money in AI actually pools. While attention fixates on model labs burning cash, a memory maker quietly became one of the most profitable and strategically vital firms in the chain. Proceeds will fund a new Korean fab and more advanced EUV capacity, deepening its grip on a scarce resource.

## Source

[Read the full story at TechCrunch](https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/10/sk-hynix-raises-26-5b-in-the-biggest-foreign-ipo-in-us-history-is-urged-to-build-new-us-fabs/)

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