https://wccftech.com/memory-prices-could-soar-if-japan-south-korea-trade-war-continues/

The trade war that the United States and China are embroiled in has taken most of the headlines recently, yet there is another trade spat brewing in Northeast Asia that will affect global memory prices in a very big way. The current relationship between Japan and South Korea took a turn for the worse when a South Korean court ruled that Nippon Steele, who used forced Korean labor during World War 2, owed Korean survivors $89,000 each in damages.

The Japanese have countered saying reparations were made complete in the 1965 accord that saw the two countries reestablish in peaceful diplomatic relations. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had threatened earlier this year that a failure to reverse the ruling would result in Japanese retaliation via economic means. Japan has put a serious choke on the export of a few crucial chemicals used in processor and memory semiconductor manufacturing, of which South Korea is its largest customer.