Asian tech firms seeking to follow SK Hynix may find foreign investors more selective

By Kane Wu and Saqib Iqbal Ahmed

HONG KONG/NEW YORK, July 13 (Reuters) - South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix may have had a rousing $26.5 billion U.S. share sale and market debut last week, but that owed much to its pivotal role in the AI supply chain and timing.

Other Asian tech firms are expected to take note and also look to tap foreign investors but they are likely to find appetite for AI-related companies more selective, investors say.

Current levels of investor exuberance over AI are going to be hard to maintain as fears grow about the sustainability of AI-driven stock rallies, while chip stocks also tend to be volatile due to the historical boom-and-bust cyclical nature of the industry.

"SK Hynix is a special case because it is large, liquid, AI-critical, and hard for many U.S. investors to own directly," said Ophir Gottlieb, CEO of Capital Market Laboratories.

"I'd call this timing for SK about as perfect as possible, but becoming less perfect daily."

Giuseppe Sette, co-founder of AI investment analytics platform Reflexivity, agrees, saying he doesn't expect a broad opening of floodgates.

SK Hynix, the leading developer of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) in Nvidia processors, "works because it plugs a specific hole in U.S. portfolios — AI memory — at peak enthusiasm ... 'me-too' listings without a clear AI or scarcity angle shouldn't assume the same reception", he said.

KIOXIA AND DAYONE

Relentless investment in artificial intelligence has spurred the Asian tech sector to raise a record $84 billion for the year to July 10, more than triple the amount for the same period in 2025, LSEG data shows.

Of that, ADRs and global depositary receipts (GDRs) accounted for $29 billion, an all-time high for that category.

The U.S., in particular, offers a wider pool of investors, more liquidity and stronger governance, which tends to result in higher valuations than at home.

Companies known to be interested in a similar move to SK Hynix include Japanese memory chipmaker Kioxia, which has said it's planning an ADR listing as soon as the April-June quarter of 2027. Its shares have surged about sixfold this year on AI demand.

Singapore-based data centre operator DayOne, while in talks with a potential buyer, is also planning a U.S.-Singapore dual-listing targeting a valuation of $20 billion, sources with knowledge of the matter have said.

DayOne did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

There are likely to be a steady stream of others, bankers say.

"The current technology fundraising cycle still has considerable runway. We believe the structural drivers behind AI investment will continue to support healthy capital markets activity over the next two to three years," said James Wang, head of Asia ex-Japan ECM at Goldman Sachs.

Aaron Oh, UBS head of ECM for Asia Pacific, said he expects tech fundraising to continue "but faster and larger, and I'd expect Asian issuers to access this cycle earlier than they have in the past."

But even when demand is robust, companies may need to adjust valuation expectations.

Taiwan's Unimicron Technology, a printed circuit board maker, raised $1.4 billion last week from a global depositary share issue that was oversubscribed multiple times. The deal was, however, priced near the lower end of a marketed range and at a 5.3% discount to its closing price on the day.

Investors still have appetite for Asian tech issuance, but due to increased volatility they require appropriate pricing and are exercising greater discipline, said Manoj Jain, co-founder and co-CIO of Hong Kong-based hedge fund Maso Capital.

(Reporting by Kane Wu in Hong Kong and Saqib Ahmed in New York; Additional reporting by Selena Li in Hong Kong and Yantoultra Ngui in Singapore; Editing by Sumeet Chatterjee and Edwina Gibbs)