According to DRAMeXchange, a B2B Web site for the chip markets, the spot market prices in Asia of 128-megabit SDRAM memory chips gained 2.15 percent to US$4 to US$4.5 on Monday. The price of 256-megabit SDRAM chips, the new chip products that have become the country's core export item, edged up to US$12 to US$15 apiece, up 0.74 percent over the weekend.

Meanwhile, sources reported that Samsung Electronics and Hynix Semiconductor have once again been attempting to raise their chip prices for long-term customers. The two firms plan to hike the contract chip prices by about 10 percent through negotiations with such customers within this week.

(Cho Hyeong-rae, hrcho@chosun.com )