Memory: The Sector With No Memory

There’s an old Saturday Night Live sketch from the late 1980s to 1990 called “Mr. Short-Term Memory,” and it featured Tom Hanks playing a character who developed severe amnesia after a pear fell on his head. The memory loss was so severe that Mr. Short-Term Memory would walk into a room and immediately forget where he was and why.

Like Mr. Short-Term Memory, the equity market is often described as having no memory, and nowhere has that been more evident lately than, fittingly, in the memory sector. Memory stocks were all the rage for much of 2025 and the first half of 2026, with demand hitting a fever pitch in the second quarter. The month of July saw these stocks come crashing down to earth, as investors quickly forgot why they couldn’t get their hands on shares of these companies fast enough. In August, the switch flipped again, and now investors can’t seem to figure out why they sold these stocks in July in the first place!

After more than tripling – yes, tripling – from the original launch date in early April to its late June high, the Roundhill Memory ETF (DRAM) crashed more than 44% in barely a month into its late July low. Since then, the ETF has rallied 37%, taking it back above its 50-day moving average (DMA) for the first time since 7/14. Despite that rally off the lows, DRAM is still down 23.8% from its closing high, meaning that it would have to rally over 30% just to get back to those highs again.

The table below shows how DRAM’s 10 largest holdings have performed relative to their Q2 highs and their summer lows. Every single one of them fell at least 30% from their Q2 highs to the summer lows, and every single one of them also rallied at least 20% from their lows. Despite those rallies, though, all but one of DRAM’s 10 largest holdings are still below their Q2 high. The one exception is Nanya Technology, which trades in Taiwan. Meanwhile, three stocks are still down at least 43% from their Q2 highs, meaning that they would all have to rally at least another 75% to get back to those highs. Now, that would be a memorable rally!