Micron to report Q4 earnings as memory boom powers on

Memory giant Micron ( MU ) will report its fourth quarter earnings after the bell on Wednesday, providing investors with insights into the state of the memory and AI market.

Micron's fortunes, along with those of fellow memory chip producers Samsung ( 005930.KS ) and SK Hynix ( SKHY ), have soared amid sky-high demand driven by the global AI buildout.

Case in point, Micron's third quarter earnings per share shot up 1,214% year over year, while its revenue rocketed 345%.

The company's stock price has also exploded, rising a staggering 279% year to date and 587% over the last 12 months, as of Tuesday.

Micron is also making big bets on its future growth. In August, the company announced that it would invest up to $10 billion over the next 10 years to build out a "long-horizon premier research institution" in Boise, Idaho.

While the AI boom has been a boon for memory makers, it's taking a toll on other sectors of the tech industry.

Consumer electronics manufacturers have raised prices on their devices to offset the rising cost of memory and storage chips. Most recently, Apple ( AAPL ) raised the prices of its iPhone 18 Pro line by $100 versus its iPhone 17 Pro .

While the price increases have cut into the number of devices manufacturers are selling, the higher price tags have offset much of the negative impact on their bottom lines

For the fourth quarter, Wall Street is anticipating earnings per share of $31.83, according to Bloomberg analyst consensus estimates. That's an increase of 950% versus the EPS of $3.03 the company reported in Q4 last year.

Revenue is expected to come in at $51.49 billion, up 355% from the $11.31 billion the company saw in the year-ago quarter.

DRAM, which goes into the high-bandwidth memory used in data centers, is expected to generate $38.22 billion in sales, while NAND storage chips are set to bring in $12.29 billion.

Memory and chip stocks have been volatile in recent weeks amid concerns about AI safety, following Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's call earlier this month to slow the development of frontier AI models.

Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoofinance.com . Follow him on X at @DanielHowley .