SK Hynix to Buy Back and Burn Over 40 Trillion Won in Treasury Shares in Unprecedented Move

SK Hynix is set to acquire and incinerate a massive volume of its own shares worth over 40 trillion won.

This marks the largest treasury share incineration in the history of South Korean listed companies.

SK Hynix announced in a regulatory filing today that it held a board meeting and resolved to purchase 24.07 million common shares—totaling approximately 40.0434 trillion won—through open-market purchases and retire all of them.

This scale accounts for 3.3 percent of the company's total issued shares, with the acquisition period scheduled to run for about three months from the 20th of this month to November 19th.

SK Hynix explained that while its cash-generation capability has dramatically improved—with net cash reaching 69 trillion won as of the end of the second quarter, driven by the AI memory boom—it decided to implement large-scale shareholder returns because its stock price has failed to fully reflect the company's intrinsic value.

In line with this, SK Hynix is significantly revamping its shareholder return policy.

The company has decided to expand the return benchmark for cumulative free cash flow generated from 2025 to 2027 from the previous range of "around 50 percent" to "50 percent or more."

In addition to treasury share incineration, SK Hynix will pursue cash dividends concurrently and is reviewing plans to issue special dividends on top of fixed dividends.

Specific details regarding the scale and methods of these additional returns will be officially announced during the third-quarter earnings release following board approval.

Earlier today, SK Hynix's stock tumbled 9.75 percent in the regular session to finish in the 1.5 million won range, weighed down by Middle East risks and intensifying sell-offs across the semiconductor sector. However, following the post-market disclosure of the massive 40 trillion won shareholder return package, the stock surged nearly 10 percent, hitting the daily limit up in after-hours block trading.

Reported by Lee Hyeon-yeong | Video by Seo Byeong-wook | Graphics by Yang Hye-min | Produced by SBS Digital News
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.