SK Hynix: Foreign Investors Unload $6.6 Billion Even as AI Supercycle Sparks 72% Margins

Despite a 72% operating margin and HBM market dominance, international investors sold 19.53 trillion won of SK Hynix shares in May, rotating into robotics and energy storage while Wall Street remains bullish.

A curious divergence is playing out in Seoul. Foreign funds are exiting SK Hynix at a pace not seen in months, yet the company’s operational metrics have never looked stronger. The chipmaker posted a 72% operating margin in the first quarter of 2026, its factories are sold out through year-end, and it now commands more than half of the global HBM market. Against that backdrop, the selling looks less like a vote of no confidence and more like a tactical repositioning.

Over the twelve trading sessions starting May 7, international investors dumped a net 19.53 trillion won of SK Hynix shares. For the week ending May 18 alone, net selling reached 5.33 trillion won. Combined with Samsung Electronics, the two semiconductor titans accounted for 73% of all foreign net selling on the Korean exchange during that period, which totalled 14.45 trillion won. That translates to roughly $6.6 billion of outflows from the pair.

Where the money is moving

The capital is not abandoning Korea altogether. Instead, it is rotating into sectors with independent growth narratives. Robotics and energy storage have emerged as the primary beneficiaries. Doosan Robotics attracted net inflows of 370 billion won, while Samsung SDI saw purchases of 148.9 billion won in energy storage. On the KOSDAQ, Fadu and Seojin System drew 155.6 billion and 128 billion won respectively.

Kang Jin-hyuk of Shinhan Securities describes the move as a large-scale portfolio rebalancing. After the steep valuation gains in semiconductors, international funds are booking profits and lowering their overweight positions. The KOSPI itself held steady, closing at 7,847.71 on May 22, up 0.41%, suggesting the rotation is orderly rather than panicked.

Dividends shift the landscape

Despite the current outflows, the dividend picture is brightening. Analysts expect that by 2026, SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics together will distribute 36% of all domestic dividends in South Korea. That would be a sharp jump from the 22% share they represented last year, when the two companies paid out roughly 12 trillion won. The financial sector’s contribution is forecast to fall from 20% to 18% as the chipmakers’ payout volumes dominate the market.

For SK Hynix specifically, the dividend growth argument provides a longer-term anchor. But it does little to counter the immediate selling pressure.

The counterargument from Wall Street

While foreign funds withdraw, US analysts are issuing some of the most bullish calls on record. Wedbush Securities has added SK Hynix to its elite “AI 30” index, with analyst Daniel Ives citing a historic supercycle driven by cloud providers massively scaling data centres. Nomura Securities provides a concrete target: it has more than doubled its price objective from 2.34 million to 4 million won, arguing that AI applications are moving from training to inference, a shift that demands exponentially more memory capacity.

The numbers back up the optimism. First-quarter revenue breached 50 trillion won for the first time, and operating profit landed at roughly 37 trillion won. With long-term contracts already locking up the entire year’s HBM output, SK Hynix is now preparing a US initial public offering. A confidential filing for American depositary receipts is reportedly under way, and the deal could raise up to $14 billion this summer.

Mixed signals, one stock

The stock closed at 1.941 million won on the Friday after the IPO news broke, a gain of roughly 11%, putting it within striking distance of the 2 million won level that would clear the way technically. For now, the tug-of-war between profit-taking by foreign funds and the fundamental bull case remains unresolved. The market is clearly separating yesterday’s winners from tomorrow’s themes — robotics and storage today, semiconductors tomorrow — but the underlying strength of SK Hynix’s business suggests this rotation may be a pause, not a reversal.