Apple Says It Will Keep Paying More for Memory Chips After December. That's Good News for Micron Stock.

Apple (AAPL) CEO John Ternus says memory chip prices will keep climbing into next year, a signal that demand remains strong even as Apple absorbs gross margin compression. For Micron (MU), that is a direct pricing tailwind.

MU trades near $860 after a 6% drop, a level that works out to under 6 times forward earnings. That multiple suggests the market has already priced in a sharp decline in memory profits. Ternus's comments cut against that assumption: a major buyer is telling the market it expects to keep paying more after December.

The read-through is not uniform across memory suppliers. Kioxia (KXIAY), the Japanese flash memory maker, guides to just 1% sequential revenue growth for the December quarter. Micron primarily sells DRAM, and the article frames it as better positioned to capture sustained price increases than a flash-focused peer.

Interpretation: the gap between Ternus's pricing outlook and MU's sub-6x forward multiple is the core of the bull case. If memory prices keep rising, the earnings decline the market appears to be pricing may not materialize. Kioxia's muted 1% guide is a reminder that flash and DRAM exposure can diverge.