https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=94600
--- Comment #4 from Richard Biener <rguenth at gcc dot gnu.org> --- We're going through rtx store_expr (tree exp, rtx target, int call_param_p, bool nontemporal, bool reverse) { ... normal_expr: /* If we want to use a nontemporal or a reverse order store, force the value into a register first. */ tmp_target = nontemporal || reverse ? NULL_RTX : target; temp = expand_expr_real (exp, tmp_target, GET_MODE (target), (call_param_p ? EXPAND_STACK_PARM : EXPAND_NORMAL), &alt_rtl, false); which expands directly into target via else if (optimize >= 1 && modifier != EXPAND_CONST_ADDRESS && modifier != EXPAND_INITIALIZER && modifier != EXPAND_MEMORY && TREE_READONLY (array) && ! TREE_SIDE_EFFECTS (array) && TREE_CODE (index) == INTEGER_CST && (VAR_P (array) || TREE_CODE (array) == CONST_DECL) && (init = ctor_for_folding (array)) != error_mark_node) { ... /* If VALUE is a CONSTRUCTOR, this optimization is only useful if this doesn't store the CONSTRUCTOR into memory. If it does, it is more efficient to just load the data from the array directly. */ rtx ret = expand_constructor (value, target, modifier, true); and then store_constructor (exp, target, 0, int_expr_size (exp), false); store_constructor cannot anymore fail and since we're invoking expand_constructor with avoid_temp_mem == true that's the place to fixup I think, possibly by amending /* Handle calls that pass values in multiple non-contiguous locations. The Irix 6 ABI has examples of this. */ if (target == 0 || ! safe_from_p (target, exp, 1) || GET_CODE (target) == PARALLEL || modifier == EXPAND_STACK_PARM) { if (avoid_temp_mem) return NULL_RTX; with the case for volatile target. Or of course at the very toplevel by passing down a different expand modifier or by skipping ctor folding. Note that an aggregate volatile assignment is not very well specified when bitfields are involved - C says the copy is elementwise and then strict volatile bitfield semantics would suggest that N stores happen together with the required reads for RMW cycles. So I'm not sure if this is really a bug or rather wrong user expectation.