Samsung hits $1 trillion valuation as AI rally lifts shares over 10%

Shares of Samsung Electronics surged more than 10% Wednesday, pushing the chip giant's market capitalization past the $1 trillion mark as investors continued to pile into artificial intelligence-linked stocks.

Samsung became the second Asian company to cross the $1 trillion mark, after TSMC. The company first crossed that $1 trillion market capitalization threshold on Feb. 26, according to FactSet data.

The rally followed Samsung Electronics' record first-quarter earnings last week. Operating profit surged more than eightfold to 57.2 trillion won, while revenue climbed to a record 133.9 trillion Korean won

Samsung's first-quarter operating profit also topped its full-year 2025 profit of 43.6 trillion won.

The rally also followed a Bloomberg report that Apple has held exploratory talks with Samsung and Intel to produce chips for Apple devices in the U.S., potentially diversifying beyond longtime supplier TSMC.

Shares of South Korean chip behemoth SK Hynix also jumped more than 9%, helping push the benchmark index Kospi more than 5% to top 7,000 for the first time.

Sales of high-bandwidth memory, or HBM chips, have boosted Samsung's profitability, but the company continues to face intense competition in the HBM market after losing its early advantage to rival SK Hynix.

Samsung has been working to narrow the gap with SK Hynix in the fast-growing AI memory segment. In February, the company said it had become the world's first firm to begin mass production of HBM4 chips and start deliveries to undisclosed customers.

HBM4 represents the sixth and latest generation of high-bandwidth memory technology. The chips are expected to play a key role in Nvidia's upcoming Vera Rubin AI architecture, which aims to power advanced AI workloads in data centers.

Morningstar said that strong demand tied to AI infrastructure spending, combined with tight supply caused by capacity constraints, has pushed up semiconductor chip prices and other input costs, particularly in South Korea.

— CNBC's Dylan Butts contributed to this report.