Micron Technology MU, the memory-chip giant sitting squarely in the middle of the AI spending boom, has its shares gained roughly 1.8% Monday morning. Investors also had a new risk to digest. Barron's reported that Apple AAPL is testing memory from China's CXMT for devices sold in China, potentially opening another door for the fast-growing Chinese chipmaker. But testing is not an order. Any deal would still face U.S. government scrutiny, and Apple has not publicly confirmed one. For Micron, the immediate story remains much bigger: AI demand is running hot.
The numbers are enormous. Micron generated $41.46 billion in quarterly revenue, up from $23.86 billion sequentially and only $9.30 billion a year earlier. Data-center revenue alone blew past $25 billion as AI servers swallowed increasingly large amounts of advanced memory. Operating cash flow hit $25.39 billion. Even better, management is pushing multiyear customer agreements that could lock in demand and make future revenue less hostage to the memory industry's notorious boom-and-bust cycle. CXMT may be coming. But Micron is not standing still while it arrives.
Here is the catch: investors are already paying like this AI supercycle has plenty of runway left. GuruFocus puts Micron at $872.10 against a GF Valueâ„¢ estimate of just $434.54, meaning the stock trades 100.69% above that benchmark. That is a monster premium. It does not kill the bull case, but it raises the bar dramatically. Micron now needs AI demand, pricing power and margins to keep delivering while Chinese competition grows in the background. At this valuation, great results may no longer be enough. Micron needs great results to keep getting better.
