Bank of Korea Says the AI Chip Trade Is Now a Financial Stability Problem

South Korea's economy is booming on demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips, with nominal GDP growing 21.9% in the first half of 2026.

Almost 70% of that expansion comes from semiconductors alone.

How the AI Chip Boom Is Powering South Korea

The KOSPI is South Korea's benchmark stock index, dominated by semiconductor giants Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. Both companies now concentrate close to half of their market cap and most of their earnings growth in the first six months of 2026.

The Bank of Korea confirms a scale of chip revenues not seen since the 1970s. Semiconductor exports exceed 40% of the country's total shipments in some months during 2026. Real GDP growth forecasts have been revised upward to 3.3%-3.5% for the year.

Global demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and advanced DRAM chips is the direct trigger of the rally. Nvidia, AMD, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta, and Oracle all depend on Samsung and SK Hynix for AI accelerator memory. Along with Micron, they are the only large-scale global suppliers of these advanced chips.

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