SanDisk Up 692%: The NAND Story Hiding Behind HBM

While everyone obsesses over HBM and Micron, SanDisk quietly printed an all time high near USD 2,021 and closed around USD 1,980, up a staggering 692% year to date. Q3 revenue rose 251% year on year. This is the other half of the memory story, and it deserves more attention than it gets.

Why NAND is tight too

AI data centres do not just need high bandwidth memory, they need enormous amounts of fast storage. That has pulled NAND into the same supply crunch as DRAM, and SanDisk as a relatively pure NAND play gets maximum operating leverage when prices spike.

The part that worries me

A 692% move in a year is the definition of parabolic. Memory is cyclical, and the violence of the upside tends to be matched by the downside when supply normalises. The revenue growth is spectacular, but spectacular growth at a cycle peak is exactly when valuations are most dangerous.

My approach

I keep core NAND exposure because the shortage is real and multi-quarter, but I trim into vertical days like this rather than adding. Riding a parabola without a plan is how good theses turn into bad outcomes.