Bank of America Merrill Lynch: Samsung’s long-term contract pricing limits price declines with no cap on upside, and memory demand will continue to rise through 2028.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BofA ML) released a storage industry research report over the weekend, showing that Samsung Electronics has included 60% to 70% of its memory sales in long-term supply agreements (LTAs). The contract terms are heavily skewed toward the supplier: quarterly price cuts typically do not exceed 5%, while price hikes can reach 10% to 20% with virtually no upper limit. The LTAs signed with major U.S. tech companies mostly adopt a five-year rolling model, allowing renewal around the expiration of the first year to form long-term binding relationships. BofA ML believes this model enhances the revenue certainty of Samsung’s memory business while retaining the flexibility to raise prices during periods of tight supply and demand. Against the backdrop of sustained growth in AI server demand and the time required for memory makers to ramp up production capacity, leading players are leveraging LTAs to lock in demand from major clients and strengthen price control. Separately, data from DRAMeXchange shows that the spot price of 16Gb DDR5 has surged 733% year-on-year to $51, while DDR4 series prices have risen even more by 722% to 896%. The spot price of 1Tb NAND wafers has increased 415% year-on-year to $26.4, with a further 3% rise week-on-week. The contract price of 64GB DDR5 memory modules has exceeded $1,480, while DDR4 modules hit $1,300, both marking all-time highs; client SSD prices have doubled since the end of 2025. BofA ML attributes the factors supporting August prices to three points: increased downstream restocking demand, OEMs preparing for new product launches, and falling channel inventory. The underlying driver is the surge in AI capital expenditure: the five hyperscale cloud providers are projected to combine for $730 billion in total capital expenditure in 2026, a year-on-year increase of around 100%, and are expected to exceed $1 trillion annually from 2027 to 2028, continuously supporting upward momentum in memory demand.