Japanese stocks fell for a fourth week, with the benchmark average dropping to a 20-year low.
Exporters such as TDK Corp led declines amid concerns that a US-led war with Iraq will damp overseas demand for their goods.
"Domestic investors are selling shares outright to reduce their risk as a war with Iraq could hurt the US economy," said Xinyi Lu, chief strategist at UFJ Bank Ltd in Tokyo. "Lower consumer demand in the US from a war will be very negative for Japanese exporters."
The Nikkei 225 Stock Average lost 1.7 percent for the week, while the Topix index fell 1.3 percent. Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc had a record drop on concern the Nikkei's dip below 8000 would force lenders to book wider losses on stock holdings.
South Korean stocks slid for a third week after a probe into SK Group's accounting prompted US$4 billion of redemptions from mutual funds. Kookmin Bank and other lenders to SK companies led the drop. The KOSPI index shed 1.5 percent for the week.
The TAIEX Index gained 2.9 percent this week, its biggest weekly advance in seven weeks. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index added 0.6 percent. Citic Pacific Ltd gained after the Hong Kong arm of China's biggest investment company said it will pay a special dividend.
In Japan, TDK slid 7.5 percent for the week and was the heaviest drag on the Nikkei. Japan's largest maker of magnetic parts for hard disk drives gets as much as two-thirds of its sales from abroad. Tokyo Electron Ltd, the world's No. 1 maker of chip-production equipment, dropped 2.6 percent this week. The company's shares were the second-biggest drag on the Nikkei.
Sumitomo Mitsui, the world's fourth-largest lender by assets, declined 6.8 percent this week. The bank was the third-heaviest drag on the Nikkei. Sumitomo Mitsui and six rival banks' investment losses rose more than fourfold to ¥5.8 trillion as of March 7, from a year ago, Daiwa Institute of Research said.
Japanese technology giant Softbank Group Corp said Tuesday it has sold its stake in Nvidia Corp, raising US$5.8 billion to pour into other investments. It also reported its profit nearly tripled in the first half of this fiscal year from a year earlier. Tokyo-based Softbank said it sold the stake in Silicon Vally-based Nvidia last month, a move that reflects its shift in focus to OpenAI, owner of the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT. Softbank reported its profit in the April-to-September period soared to about 2.5 trillion yen (about US$13 billion). Its sales for the six month period rose 7.7 percent year-on-year
CRESTING WAVE: Companies are still buying in, but the shivers in the market could be the first signs that the AI wave has peaked and the collapse is upon the world Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reported a new monthly record of NT$367.47 billion (US$11.85 billion) in consolidated sales for last month thanks to global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Last month’s figure represented 16.9 percent annual growth, the slowest pace since February last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 11 percent. Cumulative sales in the first 10 months of the year grew 33.8 percent year-on-year to NT$3.13 trillion, a record for the same period in the company’s history. However, the slowing growth in monthly sales last month highlights uncertainty over the sustainability of the AI boom even as
AI BOOST: Next year, the cloud and networking product business is expected to remain a key revenue pillar for the company, Hon Hai chairman Young Liu said Manufacturing giant Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday posted its best third-quarter profit in the company’s history, backed by strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers. Net profit expanded 17 percent annually to NT$57.67 billion (US$1.86 billion) from NT$44.36 billion, the company said. On a quarterly basis, net profit soared 30 percent from NT$44.36 billion, it said. Hon Hai, which is Apple Inc’s primary iPhone assembler and makes servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s AI accelerators, said earnings per share expanded to NT$4.15 from NT$3.55 a year earlier and NT$3.19 in the second quarter. Gross margin improved to 6.35 percent,
FAULTs BELOW: Asia is particularly susceptible to anything unfortunate happening to the AI industry, with tech companies hugely responsible for its market strength The sudden slump in Asia’s technology shares last week has jolted investors, serving as a stark reminder that the world-beating rally in artificial intelligence (AI) and semiconductor stocks might be nearing a short-term crest. The region’s sharpest decline since April — triggered by a tech-led sell-off on Wall Street — has refocused attention on cracks beneath the surface: the rally’s narrow breadth, heavy reliance on retail traders, and growing uncertainty around the timing of US Federal Reserve interest-rate cuts. Last week’s “sell-off is a reminder that Asia’s market structure is just more vulnerable,” Saxo Markets chief investment strategist Charu Chanana said in
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