In the world’s biggest wholesale electronics marketplace in the bustling Huaqiangbei district of the southern Chinese metropolis of Shenzhen, memory is the new gold.
On a Tuesday in January, a merchant surnamed Ye held up a list of prices that looked more appropriate for luxury goods than humble computer parts. A pair of 32-gigabyte, 6000-megahertz Double Data Rate 5 (DDR5) memory sticks was priced at 6,878 yuan (US$990) – having shot up nearly fivefold since September.
“In my over 10 years in…
