Micron, Sandisk Outrun Nvidia in 2026 as AI Memory Crunch Lifts Shares 200% and 500%
Updated
Updated · The Motley Fool · Jul 18
Micron, Sandisk Outrun Nvidia in 2026 as AI Memory Crunch Lifts Shares 200% and 500%
2 articles · Updated · The Motley Fool · Jul 18
Summary
Micron shares have risen nearly 200% and Sandisk almost 500% in 2026, far outpacing Nvidia’s 11% gain as investors bet AI’s biggest bottleneck is now memory and storage.
Jensen Huang flagged that shift at CES 2026, arguing AI systems must retain far more user context over time, pushing data-center memory needs beyond what current high-bandwidth memory setups can handle.
Micron’s fiscal Q3 2026 revenue reached $41.4 billion, with cloud memory jumping to $13.7 billion from $3.3 billion and core data-center revenue to $11.5 billion from $1.5 billion a year earlier.
Sandisk posted $5.9 billion in fiscal Q3 2026 revenue, up 251%, as data-center sales climbed to $1.4 billion from $197 million and edge revenue to $3.6 billion from $927 million.
Longer-term supply deals are reinforcing that demand: Micron signed 16 agreements backed by $22 billion in commitments, while Sandisk signed three contracts worth at least $42 billion, even as both stocks recently pulled back in an AI sell-off.