Wahbang Electronics hits a new high and reaches the daily limit! Taiwan's memory chip sector leads the rally, and Taiwanese DRAM manufacturers' rankings are further upgraded.

The strong rally driven by the supply and demand imbalance in the memory market continues to heat up, with Winbond Electronics (2344) today breaking through the daily limit-up, closing at NT$67.9, a single-day increase of 9.87%, making it the top trading volume and value in the Taiwan stock market. This is the third consecutive trading day that Winbond has moved against the trend, with a cumulative three-day gain of 20.37%. Simultaneously, memory concept stocks such as Macronix and Powertech have also rallied across the board, forming the most dazzling rally focus on the market.

Limit-up Search for New Highs, Challenging the 69.1 Yuan Previous Peak

Winbond Electronics showed strong buying momentum at the opening today, with trading volume surpassing 200,000 shares by 10 a.m., officially locking in the limit-up price of NT$67.9. The stock price is now poised to challenge the historical high of 69.1 yuan since 2025.

Technical analysis indicates that Winbond’s stock price has already touched the upper Bollinger Band and remains above all short-term moving averages, forming a typical bullish arrangement. Short-term momentum is quite strong, reflecting a market with a strong bullish sentiment. The capital driving force is also not to be underestimated, with institutional investors actively accumulating over multiple days, especially foreign investors, demonstrating their confidence in the company’s prospects.

Revenue Nears 40% YoY Growth, Memory Shortage Creates Ranking Rise for Taiwanese DRAM Manufacturers

Winbond’s latest operational data shows that its November consolidated revenue reached NT$8.629 billion, a month-on-month growth of about 5%, and a year-on-year increase of 38.7%, creating the best single-month performance in over three years. The total revenue for the first 11 months was NT$79.635 billion, with a year-over-year growth rate of 5.85%.

This strong growth is driven by structural changes caused by the rapid expansion of global artificial intelligence applications. Major memory manufacturers are adjusting their capacity allocations to seize high-margin high-bandwidth memory (HBM) markets, leading to severe supply shortages in traditional DRAM and flash memory (Flash). Winbond timely increased capital expenditure to respond to market demand reversal, resulting in a significant increase in customer orders, and its position in the Taiwanese DRAM manufacturer rankings has improved markedly.

From an industry supply and demand perspective, the average inventory weeks for major DRAM manufacturers have rapidly shortened from 13-17 weeks at the end of last year to 2-4 weeks in October this year, with inventories depleted to very low levels. The structural tightening on the supply side is even more evident—global leading manufacturers prioritize capacity allocation to DDR5 and HBM, and combined with the simultaneous adjustments by Chinese peers, DDR4 specifications have faced fundamental supply shortages since the third quarter.

Demand remains strong. Mainstream storage devices such as enterprise SSDs (eSSD) still require DDR4 specifications, and actual market demand far exceeds expectations, further highlighting the strategic position of companies like Winbond.

Foreign Investors Optimistic Until 2026, Spot Prices Surge 5 to 6 Times

Recent research reports from foreign institutions unanimously remain bullish on the memory industry, expecting price upward momentum to continue until 2026, and advising investors “not to rush to take profits.” The reports specifically emphasize that supply of 16Gb DDR4 is the most scarce, with spot prices soaring to about US$100 per chip, compared to the industry reference price of US$45.5, creating a huge gap.

Interestingly, the market has even seen rare “price inversion”—the spot price of DDR4 temporarily surpassed DDR5. From a low point of less than NT$1 per chip at the beginning of the year, the fourth quarter has seen an astonishing increase of 5 to 6 times.

Foreign investors also estimate that the supply gap for NOR Flash will continue to widen in 2026, with prices expected to increase by more than 20% in the first quarter of next year. Based on this, foreign institutions reaffirm their positive outlook on the memory sector and explicitly list Winbond as their top recommended stock.

Institutional Investors Continue to Increase Positions, Capacity Expansion Fuels Upward Momentum

To seize this market opportunity, Winbond is launching a dual-axis capacity expansion strategy. The Taichung plant will continue to increase output of NOR Flash, NAND Flash, and mature process DRAM; the new Kaohsiung plant plans to increase monthly DRAM capacity from the current 15,000 wafers to 24,000-25,000 wafers, with the goal of mass production of more advanced 16nm process products in the first quarter of 2026. The CUBE stacking technology platform is expected to contribute significantly to revenue starting from 2027.

Market research firms predict that the global DDR4 supply-demand gap will exceed 10% by 2026. With downstream customers shifting to DDR5 and the changing price gap between the two, Winbond is expected to enter the most profitable phase in 2026.

The capital side is even more proactive. Last week, statistics show that foreign investors, investment trusts, and proprietary traders collectively increased their holdings of Winbond, with a net purchase of over 50,000 shares, including foreign investors alone buying over 42,000 shares in one week.

Taiwanese memory companies, due to their lack of leadership in HBM and 3D stacking (TSV) packaging and testing technology, are currently benefiting from the “spillover effect” of rising prices for standard DDR4 and DDR5 memory. Winbond, Macronix, and other original manufacturers have reduced their inventory turnover days from the previous 185 days to around 140 days, with actual improvements in revenue and profitability. Overall, Taiwanese DRAM manufacturers’ rankings in this cycle will fluctuate with memory prices and end-market demand, and Winbond’s future performance warrants close attention.