Samsung is the latest tech player to bemoan memory chip crunch. That's good news for these stocks, analysts say

Memory chips and storage drives are becoming a major bottleneck in the artificial intelligence buildout, driving companies' capital expenditures higher. Chipmakers warn the supply crunch will get worse before it gets better, and Wall Street sees an opportunity. Quarterly earnings from the hyperscalers like Alphabet and Microsoft released this week showed solid cloud revenues underpinning capex that could top $1 trillion by the end of next year, and memory prices are poised to be a key driver of those costs. Samsung executive vice president of memory Jaejune Kim said Thursday that surging demand for memory is prompting pre-orders of chips that will expand the supply crunch into next year. "Our demand fulfillment rate is now at a record low," Kim said. "Unlike previous years, customers who are concerned about supply shortages are actually bringing forward their demand for 2027 already. So currently, just based on prebooked demand alone, the supply-demand gap is looking to widen further in 2027 versus this year." Feeling the pain of higher memory costs Tech CEOs are already feeling the sting of higher prices from chipmakers in their supply chains. "We believe memory costs will drive an increasing impact on our business," Apple CEO Tim Cook said during his company's earnings call on Thursday. …