Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, is likely to see a 6 to 8 percent sequential decline in sales in the first quarter of this year amid a slow season, a US-based brokerage said yesterday.
Many investors are waiting for an investors’ conference scheduled by TSMC for Thursday, when the chipmaker would detail its results for the fourth quarter of last year and give its sales guidance for the first quarter, market analysts said.
In a research note, the US brokerage said its forecast of a sales decline for the first quarter is higher than an earlier market estimate of about a 10 percent sequential fall.
The rising demand for bitcoin mining applications helped TSMC dampen the effects of the slow season in the first quarter, which has caused the brokerage to update its sales forecast to a more optimistic one, it said.
Bitcoin mining is a peer-to-peer computer process used to secure and verify bitcoin transactions, referring to payments from one user to another in a decentralized market.
TSMC last week reported consolidated sales of NT$277.57 billion (US$9.4 billion) for the fourth quarter of last year, a sequential increase of 10.1 percent and a record high for the company.
TSMC is expected to report 50 percent gross margin for the first quarter, the brokerage said.
However, as the global smartphone market is saturated, TSMC’s sales this year could be affected, as its chips used in smartphones and related devices account for about 50 percent of the company’s total sales, it said.
A stronger New Taiwan dollar is also likely to cap TSMC’s sales this year, so the brokerage has decided to maintain a “neutral” recommendation on TSMC shares and a target price of NT$239.
Shares of TSMC yesterday gained 1.27 percent to close at NT$240 on the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
Investors would be paying attention to the first-quarter sales guidance, and the progress of the advanced 7-nanometer process and the more sophisticated 5-nanometer technology, analysts said.
DAMAGE REPORT: Global central banks are assessing war-driven inflation risks as the law of unintended consequences careens around the world, spiking oil prices Central banks from Washington to London and from Jakarta to Taipei are about to make their first assessments of economic damage after more than two weeks of conflict between the US and Iran. Decisions this week encompassing every member of the G7 and eight of the world’s 10 most-traded currency jurisdictions are likely to confirm to investors that the specter of a new inflation shock is already worrying enough to prompt heightened caution. The US Federal Reserve is widely expected to do exactly what everyone anticipated weeks ahead of its March 17-18 policy gathering: hold rates steady. The narrative surrounding that
At a massive shipyard in North Vancouver, Canadian workers grind metal beams for a powerful new icebreaker crucial to cementing the country’s presence in the increasingly contested arctic. Icebreakers are specialized, expensive vessels able to navigate in the frozen far north. And “this is the crown jewel,” said Eddie Schehr, vice president of production at the Seaspan shipyard. For Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who heads to Norway next Friday to observe arctic defense drills involving troops from 14 NATO states, Canada’s extreme north has emerged as a strategic priority. “Canada is and forever will be an Arctic nation,” he said ahead of
Chinese entrepreneur Frank Gao used to spend long hours running his social media accounts but now outsources the chore to artificial intelligence (AI) agent tool OpenClaw, which is taking China by storm despite official warnings over cybersecurity. OpenClaw, created in November by an Austrian coder, differs from bots such as ChatGPT because it can execute real-life tasks such as sending e-mails, organizing files or even booking flight tickets. “Since January, I’ve spent hours on the lobster every day,” Gao said in an interview, referring to OpenClaw’s red crustacean mascot. “We’re family.” After downloading OpenClaw, users connect it to artificial intelligence models of their
PRICE HIKES: The war in the Middle East would not significantly disrupt supply in the short term, but semiconductor companies are facing price surges for materials Taiwan’s semiconductor companies are not facing imminent supply disruptions of essential chemicals or raw materials due to the war in the Middle East, but surges in material costs loom large, industry association SEMI Taiwan said yesterday. The association’s comments came amid growing concerns that supplies of helium and other key raw materials used in semiconductor production could become a choke point after Qatar shut down its liquefied natural gas (LNG) production and helium output earlier this month due to the conflict. Qatar is the second-largest LNG supplier in the world and accounts for about 33 percent of global helium output. Helium is
RSS