TrendForce data shows that over the past two weeks, major U.S. cloud service providers have raised their eSSD procurement forecasts, potentially pushing total eSSD orders in Q4 this year to surpass the historical record set in Q3. A Citi Research report on September 21 predicted that driven by continuous learning technology, eSSD demand will grow by 52.9% year-on-year in 2027, and the NAND supply-demand gap will expand to -6.1% by then. This demand growth is primarily driven by the expansion of Agent AI in North America and the application of KV cache offloading technology in China, accelerating the rise of high-capacity QLC products. NAND manufacturers are strengthening capacity and pricing controls, and eSSD price upward pressure is expected to continue into Q4. Citi Research maintains a "Buy" rating on Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.