AI Chip Fever Crowns Kioxia Japan's Most Valuable Firm

(MENAFN) Japanese memory chipmaker Kioxia Holdings Corp. has dethroned Toyota Motor Corp. as Japan's most valuable publicly listed company by market capitalization, in a landmark reshuffling that underscores how artificial intelligence-driven demand is fundamentally redrawing the country's equity landscape.

Kioxia's stock surged 7.6% on Friday, propelling its total market value beyond 44 trillion yen — equivalent to approximately $274 billion — a striking milestone reached just 18 months after the company made its stock market debut.

Toyota, which has held the title of Japan's largest listed company for years, closed the session with a market capitalization of $273.1 billion, relinquishing its long-standing position as its shares continued to face sustained selling pressure.

Kioxia's meteoric ascent mirrors a sweeping reordering underway in global equity markets, where semiconductor and AI-linked companies have attracted powerful capital inflows on the back of soaring demand for chips powering data centers worldwide.

The chipmaker's shares have skyrocketed more than 670% since the start of the year, cementing its status as one of the strongest-performing major stocks anywhere in the world.

Japan's roster of top-tier listed companies now features a cluster of AI-adjacent names, including Murata Manufacturing — a key supplier of components destined for data center infrastructure — and Advantest, a leading manufacturer of semiconductor testing equipment.

SoftBank Group had briefly leapfrogged Toyota earlier this month, buoyed by investor enthusiasm over its artificial intelligence portfolio and mounting expectations surrounding a potential future listing by OpenAI. The rally proved short-lived, however, as a broad retreat from risk assets pulled SoftBank back down the rankings.

Kioxia traces its origins to Toshiba's memory chip division, which played a pioneering role in the development of NAND flash memory technology. The business was carved out and acquired by a Bain Capital-led consortium in 2018, before being rebranded as Kioxia the following year.

Toyota's shares, meanwhile, have shed roughly 17% since the beginning of 2025, battered by a combination of elevated oil prices, Middle East geopolitical tensions, and deepening investor unease over the global automotive industry's fraught transition toward electric vehicles and software-defined mobility.

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