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Micron Technology has crossed one of Wall Street's most exclusive thresholds.
The chipmaker hit a $1 trillion market valuation for the first time on Tuesday after shares surged 18% to top $890, propelled by a dramatic analyst upgrade and insatiable demand for the memory chips that power artificial intelligence systems.
The rally was ignited by UBS, which nearly tripled its price target on the stock from $535 to $1,625 per share — the most bullish call of any of the 46 Wall Street firms covering the company, and well above the consensus target of $684. The bank said it believes the market will begin applying a more standard valuation multiple to Micron as the structural changes AI has brought to the memory chip industry become more widely understood.
"We believe MU will continue to re-rate higher as more details emerge about the structural changes AI has driven to the entire memory complex," UBS wrote in its note.
Micron is now up more than 177% this year and has surged over 800% in the past 12 months, making it one of the best-performing stocks in the S&P 500.
For most of its history, Micron operated in one of technology's least glamorous corners, memory chips, a commodity business plagued by brutal boom-and-bust cycles. The AI revolution changed everything. Modern AI systems require enormous quantities of high-speed memory sitting right next to the processors crunching data, making chips like the ones Micron produces among the scarcest and most valuable components in an AI server.
Micron is one of only three companies in the world capable of manufacturing these chips at scale, alongside South Korea's Samsung and SK Hynix. CEO Sanjay Mehrotra told investors recently that the company had already sold out its entire 2026 supply of high bandwidth memory chips.
Big money has taken notice. Billionaire David Tepper's Appaloosa Management has made Micron its second-largest holding, while Ray Dalio's Bridgewater increased its position by nearly 66% in its most recent filing.
Micron reports its next quarterly earnings in June.
