Seoul, Jan 23 (IANS): South Korean chipmaking giant SK hynix said on Thursday its fourth-quarter earnings hit a record high on rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips, including high bandwidth memory (HBM), sharply beating market expectations.

Its 2024 revenues and operating profits also broke previous records, the company said.

The world's second-largest memory chipmaker said in a regulatory filing that its fourth-quarter net income reached 8 trillion won ($5.6 billion), shifting from a loss of 1.37 trillion won a year earlier, reports Yonhap news agency.

Its operating income for the October-December period shot up more than 20 times to 8.08 trillion won from 346 billion won a year ago. Its sales vaulted 74.8 percent on-year to 19.76 trillion won.

The earnings beat market expectations. The average estimate of net profit by analysts stood at 5.99 trillion won, according to a survey by Yonhap Infomax, the financial data firm of Yonhap News Agency.

SK hynix attributed the better-than-expected bottom line to strong demand for AI memory, solidifying its status as a world leader in HBM technology.

For the entire 2024, its net income amounted to a record 19.79 trillion won, swinging from a loss of 9.13 trillion won a year earlier.

Operating income also turned to the black, reaching a record 23.46 trillion from a loss of 7.73 trillion won in 2023. Its previous record of 20.8 trillion won was set in 2018 during the semiconductor super boom.

Annual revenue soared 102 per cent to 66.19 trillion won, exceeding the previous record of 44 trillion won set in 2022.

The company said sales of HBM continued rapid growth in the fourth quarter, accounting for more than 40 per cent of its total DRAM revenue. Steady demand for enterprise solid state drive (SSD) also lent support to the robust sales.

SK hynix is leading the HBM industry, which has been growing rapidly with a generative AI boom.