Micron Technology recently released its financial report for the first quarter of fiscal year 2026. Against the backdrop of the accelerating AI wave, the company achieved substantial growth in both revenue and profit.

On December 17, Micron Technology, a global storage chip giant, issued its financial report for the first quarter of fiscal year 2026, which ended on November 27, 2025. Amid the ongoing upsurge of artificial intelligence (AI), the company not only posted sharp growth in both revenue and profit, but also sent out a positive signal that the supply-demand dynamics of the industry had improved significantly.

In this quarter, Micron recorded revenue of $13.643 billion, representing a 57% year-on-year increase and a 21% quarter-on-quarter rise; net profit surged 180% year-on-year to reach $5.24 billion. Adjusted earnings per share stood at $4.78, significantly higher than the $3.95 generally forecast by analysts. Particularly noteworthy was that the company’s cash flow from operating activities hit as high as $8.41 billion, far exceeding expectations and demonstrating strong profitability and operational efficiency.

The core driver behind the better-than-expected performance was the explosive growth in demand for AI-related products, especially high-bandwidth memory (HBM). Micron disclosed that its full-year HBM production capacity for 2026 had been completely booked by customers. Moreover, the yield rate of its next-generation HBM4 products outperformed expectations, with volume production expected to ramp up gradually in the next quarter. Revenue from the data center business hit a record high of $2.379 billion in this quarter, as procurement from cloud service clients intensified markedly, with orders in some niche segments doubling year-on-year.

In response to the sustained robust demand, Micron has raised its full-year capital expenditure for fiscal year 2026 to $20 billion, with a focus on the construction of advanced DRAM and HBM production lines. The company’s management pointed out that current supply capacity of storage chips lags far behind the growth pace of emerging application scenarios such as AI and data centers. Given that the construction and expansion cycle of new wafer fabs typically takes three to four years, the supply-demand gap will be difficult to bridge in the short term.

Looking ahead to the second fiscal quarter, Micron provided a revenue guidance range of $18.3 billion to $19.1 billion, substantially higher than the previous market expectation of around $14.4 billion, further confirming the sustainability of the industry’s upward momentum. The company also projected that the global HBM market size is expected to exceed $100 billion by 2028, two years earlier than the original estimate, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 40%.

The capital market responded positively to the earnings report. Following the news release, Micron’s stock price rose by more than 9% in after-hours trading at one point. Despite the year-to-date cumulative increase of nearly 170%, many investment banks have still raised their target prices for the stock, while also reminding investors that the positive developments have been partially reflected in the current valuation.

From an industrial chain perspective, Micron’s strong performance once again highlights the strategic position of storage chips as the "hidden champions" of AI infrastructure. In the A-share market, companies related to storage modules, main control chips and domestic substitution have recently attracted capital attention, with enterprises including Longsys Electronics, GigaDevice Semiconductor and Shannon Semiconductor recognized as potential beneficiaries.

Overall, Micron’s solid start to fiscal year 2026 is not only a result of its own technological and production capacity layout, but also an important indicator that the entire storage industry has reached a turning point in the AI era. As computing power demand continues to expand, high-performance storage devices are moving from the sidelines to the center stage, emerging as a key component of global technological competition.