Sluggish spot market this week?

1H Contract price

Contract prices for the 1H of August have seen only minor upward adjustments; The DDR contract price is flat to slightly up (depending on the company) and meanwhile the SDRAM contract price is down slightly (again, depending on the company). Most module contract pricing is in the $50 ~ $56 range for 256MB DDR; $25 ~$27 for 128MB DDR; $45~$48 for 256MB SDRAM and $22 ~$24 for 128MB. Chip contract price quotes are at $6~$6.5 for 256Mb DDR, $3~$3.3 for 128Mb DDR, $5~$5.5 for 256Mb SDRAM and $2.5~$2.75 for 128Mb SDRAM.

Waiting For more signals for 2H August

Marketers are anticipating PC demand will be postponed until the end of August due to Intel's CPU price cuts (effective September 1). Spot market transaction volume is slowing down as marketers await further signals - the market should remain sluggish until more concrete signs are evident as pricing trends continue to be unclear.

Spot price gloom

During period of sluggish market volumes, pricing tends to trend towards the negative side. Although we also have information that DRAM markers are offering official spot quotations for $7 and above for 256Mb DDR, it is not a real deal price on the spot market because the companies do not necessarily have the allocation to deliver to the spot market (it is just used as a quotation price). We therefore exoect that this weeks spot price will remain relatively weak if volumes do not pick up.