SEOUL (Reuters) -South Korea's SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) posted on Thursday a record quarterly profit, driven by strong demand for advanced chips used in generative artificial intelligence chipsets and as some customers stockpiled semiconductors ahead of potential U.S. tariffs.

"SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) foresees that increasing competition among big tech companies to enhance inference of AI models would lead to higher demand for high-performance and high-capacity memory products," it said in a statement.

The Nvidia ( NVDA ) supplier expects to double high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chip sales for the full year compared to 2024, the company said.

SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) overtook Samsung Electronics ( SSNLF ) as the world's top memory chip maker in the first quarter due to its leadership in HBM chips, a crucial component of AI chipsets designed by the likes of Nvidia ( NVDA ) that assist the processing of vast amounts of data to train AI models.

SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) reported a 9.2 trillion won ($6.69 billion) operating profit for the April-June period, up 69% from 5.5 trillion won a year earlier.

That compared with a 9.0 trillion won average forecast by LSEG SmartEstimate, which is weighted toward analysts who are more consistently accurate. Revenue rose 35% to 22.2 trillion won during the quarter.

After posting a series of record profits boosted by strong AI demand, SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) is bracing for potential U.S. tariffs and rising competition from rivals in supplying advanced chips to Nvidia ( NVDA ), analysts say.

($1 = 1,374.5800 won)