Micron Hasn’t Memory-Holed the Chip Shortage Just Yet

The question now is whether all the bad news is out. Micron’s shares slipped another 2% Wednesday morning. The company conceded on its earnings call Tuesday that PC makers in particular are starting to cut back on memory orders, as shortages of other components hamper their production output. Those shortages are also affecting Micron directly; Chief Executive Sanjay Mehrotra said the inability to procure enough controllers and analog chips will hamper some of Micron’s own production in the current quarter.

But Micron is still more optimistic than others on key parts of the market. Mr. Mehrotra said inventory levels in the data-center segment are in “decent shape.” But market research firm TrendForce predicted last week that server DRAM prices will fall as much as 5% in the calendar fourth quarter, as cloud providers have been procuring “massive amounts” of memory over the past couple of quarters to get ahead of any production shortages. Joseph Moore of Morgan Stanley noted that even if cloud providers don’t start drawing that inventory down, they could use their stockpile “as a lever in price negotiations.”

Still, most of Wall Street is positive on Micron, with about 85% of analysts rating the stock as a buy. At about 8 times forward earnings, the shares are cheap relative to peers and their own history over the last two years. Micron also said it expects record revenue in fiscal 2022—which would mean growth of at least 10% from the just-ended year. But more clarity on the trends in DRAM pricing may be needed to get the stock working again. Even chip makers aren’t immune to the chip shortage.

Write to Dan Gallagher at [email protected]