CXMT H1 2026: Record Cash, Falling Capex, No HBM
CXMT's Shanghai debut got the headlines. The stock closed 466% above its 8.66 yuan offer price on July 27, briefly making it one of the largest listings on the mainland in nearly two decades.
The interim report filed a few weeks later got far less attention. It contains a line that matters more than the first-day pop for anyone tracking DRAM supply: revenue grew almost tenfold, and capital spending went down.
All figures in this post are in Chinese yuan. The listed entity is ChangXin Technology Group (688825); CXMT is its memory subsidiary.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
1. H1 2026 revenue was 150.31 billion yuan, up 873.6% year over year. Purchases of fixed and intangible assets came to 21.59 billion yuan — down 10.4% from 24.11 billion a year earlier.
2. Cash and equivalents plus short-term trading assets stood at 182.26 billion yuan on June 30, before the July IPO added roughly 66.61 billion more.
3. Only 29.5 billion yuan of those proceeds is tied to disclosed projects — and across all 192 pages of the interim report, "HBM" appears zero times.
The number nobody quoted
The headline results are extraordinary. Revenue of 150.31 billion yuan against 15.44 billion a year earlier. Net profit attributable to shareholders of 77.61 billion yuan, reversing a 2.33 billion loss. Gross margin on the core business of 84.84%. Operating cash flow of 131.16 billion yuan, up 2,985.6%.
The company attributes this to two things: AI infrastructure spending kept DRAM tight and prices high from the second half of 2025 onward, and CXMT ran its lines hard while shifting product mix. Note what that explanation does not say. It does not say new fabs came online. It says existing fabs sold at high prices.
Which brings up the line that got skipped. Purchases of fixed and intangible assets — capex, in plain terms — were 21.59 billion yuan, against 24.11 billion in the same period a year earlier. As a share of revenue that is a collapse from 156.2% to 14.4%.
A company that was spending one and a half times its revenue on plant is now spending one seventh of it.
Most of that spending was replacement, not expansion
Depreciation in the same half was 14.51 billion yuan, up 27.85%. Property, plant and equipment carries at 181.56 billion yuan, or 38.79% of total assets.
Subtract depreciation from capex and the net addition to the fixed asset base is about 7.08 billion yuan. The absolute capex figure looks like investment. Against the rate at which the existing base is being written down, the productive asset base barely grew. In this half, CXMT was harvesting, not building.
R&D shows the same shape. Spending rose 87.4% to 6.86 billion yuan, but as a share of revenue it fell from 23.71% to 4.56%. When the absolute number and the ratio move in opposite directions, citing either alone misleads.
The balance sheet was already loaded before the listing
Cash and equivalents stood at 143.43 billion yuan on June 30, up 176% from 51.99 billion at the end of 2025. Short-term trading financial assets rose from 20.64 to 38.83 billion. Together, 182.26 billion yuan was sitting on the balance sheet at the half-year mark.
None of it was distributed. The interim profit distribution plan is a flat "none" — the full 77.61 billion yuan stays in the business.
Then came the listing. On July 27 the company floated 6.688 billion shares on the STAR Market at 8.66 yuan, raising roughly 57.92 billion yuan at base size and about 66.61 billion with the over-allotment option fully exercised. The interim report's subsequent-events note runs its dilution math on the larger figure.
One flag for anyone reading the headline ratios: EPS of 1.2893 yuan and ROE of 81.06% are calculated on the pre-IPO share count. Post-issuance, EPS becomes 1.1432 yuan and book value per share rises from 2.2382 to 2.9614 — the proceeds added more to equity than the new shares added to the denominator.
66.6 billion raised, 29.5 billion accounted for
The prospectus named three projects: 13.0 billion yuan for DRAM process advancement, 9.0 billion for next-generation DRAM research, and 7.5 billion for memory wafer line upgrades. That totals 29.5 billion.
The book ended up more than twice that size. The oversubscription leaves roughly 37.1 billion yuan whose specific allocation is not laid out in the public materials.
Tom's Hardware reported in July 2026 that the prospectus contains no dedicated HBM project and no disclosed funding commitment to near-term HBM expansion. The interim report goes further. Across all 192 pages, the string "HBM" appears zero times — and neither does the Chinese equivalent, 高带宽内存.
The phrase 高带宽 ("high bandwidth") shows up exactly twice: once describing server memory modules, once listing generic characteristics of LPDDR4X. Neither is about HBM. No HBM product, development plan or production plan appears in the product, roadmap or risk sections. The disclosed lineup: DDR5 and LPDDR4X/5/5X in volume production, LPDDR6 at customer sampling, a fourth-generation process platform in production and a fifth in customer qualification.
One postscript. In late August, after the reporting period, press reports placed CXMT LPDDR6 in Xiaomi's XRING O3. As of August 26 the stage described was final-stage validation, not volume production — consistent with what the filing itself says.
Worth stating precisely. This is not "CXMT does not make HBM." It is "the H1 2026 interim report says nothing about HBM." It rules out neither undisclosed development nor a later filing.
Still, on the public documents alone, this company's capital is pointed at commodity DRAM volume and cost — not at HBM.
Where the timer actually sits
Outside estimates point one direction. Citrini Research figures cited by Tom's Hardware on August 5, 2026 put the three running fabs at roughly 300,000 wafer starts per month today, 350,000 by the end of 2026, and above 600,000 once the fabs under construction come online. TrendForce reported on August 4 that discussions for a second 300mm DRAM fab in Beijing's Yizhuang district are at an early stage.
A correction worth making while we are here. The claim that "CXMT targets 30% DRAM market share by 2030" circulates widely. In the Tom's Hardware piece it traces back to a forecast by investment banker Dan Niles, not company guidance. It does not appear in CXMT's own disclosure.
Put together, the falling capex line is not a signal that CXMT stopped investing. It is a timing gap between the account money arrives in and the account it leaves from. Cash accumulated, the IPO added 66.6 billion, and the fabs are identified. The spending shows up in later quarters.
What I actually watch
| Line item | Where | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Quarterly capex | Quarterly and annual reports | A jump well above the 21.6 billion yuan half-year run rate means the build phase has started |
| Construction in progress | Balance sheet notes | Moves before fixed assets do. The earliest signal available |
| Use of oversubscribed proceeds | Follow-on allocation filing | Whether the 37.1 billion goes to fabs or to research separates volume strategy from catch-up strategy |
| Fifth-generation qualification | Company disclosure | Qualification, mass production and shipping are three different events |
Value chain read-through
| Segment | What the filing implies |
|---|---|
| Commodity DRAM (DDR5, LPDDR) | This is where the disclosed spending points. Whenever supply pressure lands, it lands here first |
| HBM | No dedicated project in the prospectus. On public documents, this capital is not going there |
| Incumbent DRAM makers | The window to watch is not H1 2026 capex but the quarters in which it re-accelerates |
| Wafer fab equipment | Export restrictions on advanced tooling remain the stated constraint on the capacity roadmap |
Risks to this view
▶ The price cycle. In its own risk section the company notes DRAM moved between 7.89 and 1.78 dollars per GB across 2015 to 2025, and states that current pricing may not be sustainable. An 84.84% gross margin is a price outcome before it is an operating one.
▶ Depreciation. The 181.56 billion yuan asset base depreciates whether or not prices hold. It is invisible in an upcycle and the first thing to compress margins in a downcycle.
▶ Geopolitics. On June 8, 2026 the US Department of Defense added subsidiary CXMT Storage to its list of Chinese military companies. The company states there is no material adverse effect on ordinary operations or going concern. Separately, of 231.18 billion yuan in non-current assets, all but about 0.10 billion sits in mainland China.
▶ Vintage. Everything after June 30 is either a subsequent-events note or a third-party estimate. The capacity figures in particular are outside research, not company guidance.
The short version
In the first half of 2026 CXMT earned more than it ever has and spent less on plant than a year earlier. In late July it raised another 66.6 billion yuan. That combination gets answered by the capex line in the next few filings, not by the first-day price move.
Next in this series: the price risk paragraph the company wrote about itself — why a business posting an 84.84% gross margin put a DRAM price trough on the record in its own filing.
Sources: ChangXin Technology Group H1 2026 interim report (unaudited, 688825); Tom's Hardware, July 2026 and August 5, 2026; TrendForce, August 4, 2026; Sina Finance listing coverage, July 2026. Everything here is from public sources.
Disclaimer: This post is for informational and educational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. All investment decisions are your own responsibility.
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