Amkor's AI customers prepay $1.9 billion while its 2027 capex above $2 billion stays on its balance sheet

Twelve customers now pay to queue

Amkor▲+3.76% — Amkor, up 3.76 percent today, the largest US-headquartered provider of outsourced chip packaging and test, posted third-quarter revenue of $1.99 billion on October 26, 2026, flat with a year earlier, and 76 cents a share, two cents under consensus; the fourth-quarter guide sat below the Street too ¹². The stock closed up 8.5% at $39.94 the next day anyway ¹.

Buyers were paying for a queue: chief executive Kevin Engel said customers see packaging as "becoming one of the key bottlenecks" in AI hardware, and chief financial officer Megan Faust counted twelve customers on advance-payment deals↗ since 2025, with more in discussion ³⁴.

The filing prices the queue

The 10-Q filed on October 27↗ prices it: about $1.9 billion of customer advance payments due within 12 months, plus an October agreement worth about $1.3 billion arriving in 2027 ⁵. The filing does not name that customer; Amkor's October 21 Nvidia▼−0.39% — Nvidia, down 0.39 percent today announcement, a $1.3 billion South Korea expansion taking their agreements to $3 billion, matches the size and the month ³⁶. Only $547.6 million of prepaid cash sits in contract liabilities today, and $406.3 million of it becomes revenue over one to five years: queue money, not sales ⁵.

The build ran ahead of the cash

May brought $1.15 billion of zero-coupon convertible notes due 2031, proceeds pointed partly at capital spending; long-term debt ended September at $2.32 billion against $1.28 billion in December, and unpaid capital bills doubled to $496 million ⁵. Nine-month capital spending of $1.24 billion outran $868 million of operating cash flow ¹⁵. Faust frames 2027 above $2 billion, with Arizona taking up to 15% of its $12 billion campus, Korea $400 million to $450 million and Vietnam about $50 million ³. The queue is prepaid; the factory, so far, is borrowed.

The margin gain came from materials

Gross margin reached 18.3%, four points above last year, on materials falling from 57.5% of sales to 50.7% while depreciation climbed to 8.6% ¹. Advanced products, the flip-chip and wafer-level work at the heart of the AI story, fell 3% to $1.63 billion, even as computing hit a record 26% of sales, up from 19%, and communications slid to 37% from 51% ¹. Engel blamed the pace of loading a 300-step high-density fan-out line, not supply ⁷.

What February decides

Faust calls the balance sheet "solid through 2027," with $3.4 billion of liquidity and debt at 1.7 times EBITDA, and says 2028 may need no new borrowing ³⁴. Needham kept its Buy but cut its target to $55 from $90 on compressed sector multiples, and Morgan Stanley▲+1.45% — Morgan Stanley, up 1.45 percent today went to $63 from $70 ²⁸. February prices the 2027 bill ³⁵. The tell is whether the $1.9 billion lands as cash before Arizona phase one finishes at the end of 2027 ³⁵.