Hyundai Motor shares rise 15% to hit record high amid Nvidia tie-up speculation

Shares of Hyundai Motor rallied on Wednesday (January 7) by as much as 14.9% to hit a record high in morning trade, outperforming the benchmark KOSPI's 1.2% gain amid market speculation about a potential deeper tie-up with Nvidia.

    Hyundai’s Boston Dynamics debuted its next-generation Atlas humanoid robot at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas on Monday (January 5).

    However, an analyst at Kiwoom Securities said Hyundai's announcement about the planned deployment in its factories of Atlas humanoid robots, made at CES, was insufficient to fully explain the rally. He noted that robot production is planned at around 30,000 units by 2028 and that the Atlas product was showcased only as a static mock-up display.

    Nevertheless, he said investor expectations appeared to be rising that Hyundai Motor Group's partnership with Nvidia could extend beyond a simple chip supply relationship, following a meeting between Hyundai Motor Group Chair Euisun Chung and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang at CES.

During his first official visit in more than a decade to South Korea last October, Huang met South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, Chung and other business leaders on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Gyeongju, highlighting the company's deepening AI ties with its tech and auto industries.

Production: Jacinta Goh/Reuters