Stock-heavy profit-sharing plan sends management and union back to talks SK hynix headquarters in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province (Newsis) SK hynix union members rejected a tentative wage agreement Tuesday by just 25 votes, sending the two sides back to the negotiating table after two months of talks.Of the 15,045 votes cast, 7,535 members, or 50.08 percent, opposed the agreement, while 7,510, or 49.92 percent, supported it, the union said.Turnout reached 93.81 percent of the union’s 16,083 members. Electronic voting ran from 6 a.m. Monday to 9 a.m. Tuesday.SK hynix and the union reached a tentative agreement Thursday. It included a 6.3 percent wage increase and a new payment structure for the company’s profit-sharing bonus, known as PS.Under the proposal, 40 percent of the bonus would be paid in cash and 60 percent in SK hynix shares. Employees could sell shares representing 40 percent of the total bonus in the year they were awarded. The remaining 20 percent would be deferred and paid in two equal installments over the following two years.For the 2026 bonus, scheduled to be paid early next year, employees would have been allowed to receive in cash the portion of shares eligible for immediate sale. That would have given them the option to collect up to 80 percent of the bonus in cash.The stock-heavy structure emerged as the main source of opposition. Union members expressed concern that the value of their compensation could fluctuate with SK hynix’s share price.The dispute follows the company’s agreement last year to remove a ceiling on PS payments and allocate 10 percent of annual operating profit to the bonus pool.Management and the union are expected to resume talks, with negotiations likely to focus on reducing the share-based portion of the bonus or expanding employees’ cash payment options.It remains unclear how far management will revise the proposal after already adding a cash option for the 2026 payout.The razor-thin margin, however, has raised expectations that the two sides could reach a revised agreement relatively quickly without the dispute escalating into prolonged labor action.“Considering SK hynix’s position in the Korean economy, both sides are likely to seek a swift settlement rather than allow the dispute to escalate,” an industry source said. “The narrow vote also increases the chances of reaching an agreement.”SK hynix union members also rejected tentative wage agreements in 2023 and 2024. In both cases, management and the union resumed negotiations and eventually secured approval for revised deals.