DRAM Price Approaches Gold: 1kg Can Fetch 620g of Gold, 9kg Enough for an Apartment in Shanghai

Summary

According to data released by the Korea Trade Statistics Promotion Institute on August 26, the average export price of DRAM chips (excluding DRAM modules) from South Korea during August 1-20 reached $92,183 per kilogram (about RMB 620,000), surging 401% year-on-year. With current spot gold prices around $4,620 per ounce, one kilogram of South Korean DRAM is now equivalent to roughly 620 grams of gold—meaning DRAM costs 62% as much as gold by weight. On a weight basis, DRAM is now 1.53 times more expensive than platinum and 41.7 times more expensive than silver. Based on the median new-home price of about RMB 9,700 per square meter across 100 Chinese cities in July 2026 (per China Index Academy), a 100-square-meter apartment costs around RMB 970,000, equivalent to 1.56 kg of DRAM; in first-tier cities like Beijing or Shanghai, that rises to 9 kg. The root causes include explosive AI compute demand, HBM capacity crowding out traditional DRAM supply, and memory makers cutting output. For gamers, rising DRAM costs could push up prices of RAM modules, GPU VRAM, and game consoles, affecting upgrade budgets. For the industry, this signals a memory super-cycle that may accelerate capacity expansion and technology transitions.