SK Group Chairman Choi Tae-won (center), SK Hynix President and CEO Kwak No-joon (center left), and SK Hynix Chairman Ko Seung-beom (center right) during the company’s initial public offering (IPO) on the NASDAQ Market Site in New York, USA, on Friday, July 10, 2026.
Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images
SK Hynix Options debuted on Tuesday and will likely be a huge success thanks to record retail trading activity and people looking to find the next big AI success story.
The South Korean semiconductor sensation, which sold about $27 billion in stock in its U.S. market debut on Friday, is exactly the kind of deal retail investors have been craving: a supplier of the technology and tools needed to power the AI boom.
And these retail traders are bringing some serious firepower.
The retail sector accounted for an average of $6.7 billion in daily option premium trading last month, more than 15% above May’s all-time high and 65% above last year’s average, according to a July 7 report from Citadel Securities. Semiconductor trading became the most popular topic, accounting for more than $1 billion per day.
For many retail technology traders, SK Hynix’s memory business is a reminder that: micron – The epitome of supply chain bottleneck theory, which rose almost 1000% last year before falling 23% since its late June highs.
“People are picking up SK Hynix because NVIDIA has made it clear that they need a continuous supply of memory,” said Gav Blaxberg, founder and CEO of Wolf Financial, a vast trader collective that hosts idea-sharing events across X, YouTube and podcasts. “There is a super cycle of demand and only a few companies can supply at that scale.”
Scouring the stock market for companies that could be squeezed by the massive power, memory and other demands of the computing revolution is the latest obsession of everyday investors, who are more sophisticated than ever thanks to open source technology and AI agents.
“They’re the bottlenecks,” said David Dziekanski, founder of ETF shop Quantify Funds.
Their inspiration is Leopold Aschenbrenner, a 24-year-old former OpenAI researcher. His stock-picking skills have led to a reported $20 billion hedge fund and earned him the nickname “AI Nostradamus.”
Traders are literally built into Mr. Aschenbrenner’s picks, and by tracking 13-F and 13-G filings for new positions and sharing ideas through copycat applications like Autopilot and Dub, traders can piggyback on popular user picks.
“Leopold is like the Bill Ackman to the bottleneck fraternity in the AI space who are trying to figure out the next step in the AI story,” Dziekanski said by phone. “Everyone wants to know what trade they’re going to make next.”
SK hynix US stock
To be sure, SK Hynix’s options may have some competition in the popularity of single-stock leveraged ETFs, where volume is surging. Reuters reported last week that at least 10 ETF issuers have applied to list a single-stock exchange-traded fund tracking SK Hynix.
A Cboe spokesperson said the options would begin trading on Tuesday, but were still awaiting certification by an options clearing company at press time.
