How Does The Semiconductor Index Trend Compare To Nasdaq? Analyst Opines

Piper Sandler analyst Harsh V. Kumar noted that last week, the SOX was up 2%, while the NASDAQ and S&P were up 1% and 2%, respectively. 

Starting in geopolitics, the U.S. is again cracking down on China’s Huawei Technologies Co Ltd. The government has revoked licenses to Intel Corp INTC and Qualcomm Inc QCOM. 

Kumar noted that the move forced Intel to revise its quarterly revenue guidance, while Qualcomm did not make any changes due to its low exposure to Huawei. 

The analyst noted that Qualcomm only provided 4G modems and other Wi-Fi products to the company and expected product revenues to disappear by the end of the year. 

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co TSM also reported April revenues this week, which were up significantly year-on-year to the tune of ~60%, Kumar flagged. He noted this is largely driven by leading-edge customers such as Nvidia Corp NVDA and Apple Inc (AAPL). On Apple, the company is reportedly looking to work on implementing OpenAI’s ChatGPT into its next version of iOS.  

Recent reports indicated that Arm Holdings Inc ARM plans to commercialize its first AI chips by fall 2025.

Meanwhile, China became stricter in its retaliation to the U.S. embargo on AI chips. It canvassed its domestic tech firms, including Alibaba Group Holding Limited BABA, to use domestic AI chips.

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