Proposed plan puts 60% of profit-sharing awards in company stock, as AI earnings soar
SK hynix and its labor union have reached a tentative agreement to pay 60 percent of the chipmaker’s profit-sharing bonuses in company shares, marking a major change to the payout system agreed on last year.
The union briefed delegates on the proposed 2026 wage and collective bargaining agreement at an emergency meeting Thursday afternoon.
Under the tentative deal, 40 percent of the profit-sharing bonus would be paid in cash in the year it is awarded, while the remaining 60 percent would be paid in SK hynix shares.
Of the stock portion, shares equivalent to 40 percent of the total profit-sharing awarded could be sold in the same year, while the remaining 20 percent would be deferred.
The proposed change comes just a year after management and labor agreed on a new profit-sharing framework that was to remain in place for 10 years.
Last year, the two sides scrapped the ceiling on payouts and agreed to set aside 10 percent of annual operating profit for the bonus pool. Under the agreement, 80 percent of profit-sharing was to be paid in cash in the year it was awarded, with the remaining 20 percent deferred and paid in cash over the following two years in equal installments.
How the bonuses would be paid emerged as a key sticking point in this year’s negotiations after management proposed shifting part of the payout from cash to company shares.
The union had opposed the proposal, arguing that changing the payment method could undermine the intent of last year’s agreement.
The tentative deal also calls for a 6.3 percent wage increase and increased employee welfare perks.
The change in the profit-sharing structure has drawn particular attention as SK hynix is expected to post another sharp increase in earnings on the back of strong demand for high-bandwidth memory used in artificial intelligence computing.
If the company posts annual operating profit of 250 trillion won ($179 billion), as some brokerage houses project, the profit-sharing pool would reach 25 trillion won under the 10 percent formula. Divided evenly among SK hynix’s roughly 35,000 employees, that would translate into an average pretax bonus of about 700 million won per employee. Actual payouts would vary depending on job grade and individual performance.
Based on that average, about 280 million won would be paid in cash and roughly 420 million won in company shares under the tentative agreement.
The union is expected to put the tentative agreement to a vote by its delegates before a final deal is reached.
The revised payout plan could still face resistance from employees, as it changes the payment structure only a year into a framework that management and labor agreed to maintain for a decade. A greater reliance on stock would also leave a larger portion of employees’ compensation exposed to swings in SK hynix’s share price.
yeeun@heraldcorp.com