{"id":515925,"date":"2026-06-03T04:52:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:52:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/515925\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T04:52:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:52:10","slug":"chinas-ai-chip-demand-pushes-south-korea-into-a-rare-surplus-with-top-trade-partner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/515925\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s AI chip demand pushes South Korea into a rare surplus with top trade partner"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">South Korea has emerged as a rare bright spot among East Asian economies trading with China, as booming demand for memory chips pushes its balance with its largest trading partner back into a surplus.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The country\u2019s trade position with China had strengthened steadily this year, swinging from a US$764 million deficit in December 2025 to a US$1.1 billion surplus in February, before widening further to US$3.8 billion in May, according to data from South Korea\u2019s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Resources.<\/p>\n<p>The turnaround has been driven largely by semiconductor shipments to China, as the <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/week-asia\/lifestyle-culture\/article\/3354545\/southeast-asia-chasing-ai-boom-what-cost?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">global AI boom<\/a> fuels demand for memory chips. The surge had tightened supply and sent prices sharply higher, with 16GB DDR5 memory chips up 682 per cent and NAND flash memory prices up 807 per cent, according to Morgan Stanley.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">In May, South Korea\u2019s semiconductor exports to China jumped 243 per cent from a year earlier, the ministry\u2019s data showed.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">South Korea\u2019s improving position stands in sharp contrast to that of other East Asian economies, where rising Chinese competitiveness and shifting technology supply chains have put trade balances under increasing pressure.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Japan\u2019s export volumes to China had fallen by 10 per cent since 2022, while the post-pandemic surge in imports from China had largely been sustained, according to Marcel Thieliant, head of Asia-Pacific at Capital Economics<strong data-qa=\"ContentSchemaRender-defaultRenderMapFunctions-Component\" class=\"css-1mniedq ex3nmsa17\">.<\/strong> As a result, Japan\u2019s trade deficit with China had risen to a record 1.2 per cent of gross domestic product.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"South Korea has emerged as a rare bright spot among East Asian economies trading with China, as booming&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":515926,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[174],"tags":[291,79,79501,173556,381,125572,98388,179,18,19,17,386,223432,223430,3906,138972,2428,380,223431,384],"class_list":["post-515925","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-ai","tag-business","tag-capital-economics","tag-changxin-memory-technologies","tag-china","tag-dram","tag-east-asian","tag-economy","tag-eire","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-japan","tag-korea-economic-institute-of-america","tag-marcel-thieliant","tag-morgan-stanley","tag-nand","tag-south-korea","tag-taiwan","tag-troy-stangarone","tag-united-states"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116684386914523055","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515925"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515925\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/515926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}