China Started Building DUV Scanners and CXMT Became Its Most Valuable Listed Company

Two things landed in China on Monday and between them they did more damage to the memory trade than any earnings miss this week. Reuters reported that a Shanghai firm has started producing immersion DUV lithography scanners, the tool class ASML has effectively owned. And ChangXin Memory Technologies listed on the STAR Market, closed up 466 percent, and became the most valuable listed company in China.

Take the lithography first, because the detail matters more than the headline. The producer Reuters names is Shanghai Aishengna Electronic Technology Group, incorporated in August 2023 and state-backed, which absorbed the DUV engineering teams of Yuliangsheng and SMEE. Output is about five units this year and roughly twenty in 2027, with first deliveries to SMIC, Hua Hong and CXMT later this year. ASML expects to ship around 130 immersion systems in 2026.

No specifications have been published. Not wavelength, not numerical aperture, not resolution, overlay or throughput. SMIC has been testing a Yuliangsheng prototype since September 2025 and the tools still have to pass factory and site acceptance, which takes months. Some critical components still come from Japan. JP Morgan's line was that building a handful of immersion tools is not the same as building equipment for high volume manufacturing. Paul Triolo put the real hurdle as stable 24/7 operation over a year. ASML declined to comment and fell 8.5 percent in Amsterdam and 6.92 on the Nasdaq.

CXMT is the louder number. It priced at 8.66 yuan, opened up 470 percent at 49.50, touched 54.65 for a 530 percent gain, and closed near 49.0 for plus 466. It raised 57.92 billion yuan, about 8.6 billion dollars, or 66.61 billion with the over-allotment, making it the second-largest mainland listing ever behind Agricultural Bank of China in 2010. Market cap came out at 3.3 trillion yuan, roughly 487 billion dollars, past ICBC. Only 6.73 percent of the shares are freely tradable, which is the caveat that should travel with every one of those figures.

The operating case is real even if the valuation is a float artefact. Revenue was 50.8 billion yuan last year, up about 700 percent. CXMT is adding roughly 85,000 wafer starts a month in 2026 against SK Hynix at 60,000, Micron 30,000 and Samsung 15,000, heading toward 350,000 by year end, and its capacity is booked through 2027. There is no dedicated HBM project in the prospectus. Nomura sees 18 percent global DRAM share by end-2028.

None of this loosens the market this year. DRAM contract prices rose around 95 percent quarter on quarter earlier in 2026 and SemiAnalysis expects the imbalance to hold through 2027 and probably into 2028. So the sell-off is not about 2026 supply. It is the market pulling forward a 2028 competitive picture into today's multiple, which is a much harder thing to be right about.