Why Micron Stock Has Plunged Today

Shares of Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU) have plunged over 8% so far on Tuesday, dropping from Monday’s close of $900.20 to as low as $789 intraday before moving to around $821, as the artificial intelligence memory-chip rally continued to unwind sharply.

The selloff was triggered by a broad, global rout in semiconductor and memory stocks. Overnight, South Korea’s Kospi index collapsed nearly 11%, with memory giants Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix tumbling 13% and 15%, respectively, while Japan’s Nikkei fell about 4% on an 18% plunge in memory maker Kioxia. That weakness spilled directly into U.S. trading, dragging down Micron, SanDisk, and Western Digital.

Several catalysts converged to spook investors. Chief among them is intensifying competition from China: ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) surged roughly 466% in its Shanghai IPO debut this week, reaching a market value near $488 billion and stoking fears of memory oversupply and price erosion, even though CXMT’s commodity-DRAM focus leaves it well behind Micron in high-bandwidth memory (HBM), the AI-critical product Micron dominates.

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Compounding the anxiety, reports surfaced that a Chinese company is developing domestic deep ultraviolet (DUV) lithography equipment, raising fears Beijing could accelerate chip-equipment self-sufficiency. Meanwhile, Nvidia’s reported plans for up to $750 billion in financing tied to OpenAI and SK Hynix reignited “circular financing” concerns about the durability of AI infrastructure spending.

Despite the carnage, Micron’s underlying business remains strong: fiscal Q3 revenue hit $41.5 billion, with Q4 guidance of $50 billion. Shares had rallied over 650% over the past year before this correction, meaning even after Tuesday’s drop, Micron remains far above where it started the AI memory boom. Investors are now awaiting hyperscaler earnings from Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, and Apple this week for further signals on AI capital spending.