ReportWire

Tag: Semiconductor manufacturing

  • Intel posts profit even as it struggles to regain market share

    [ad_1]

    NEW YORK — NEW YORK (AP) — Intel has posted a profit in its first quarterly report since the U.S. government became a major shareholder in the struggling chipmaker.

    The one-time American tech icon reported a net income of $4.1 billion, or 90 cents per share, in the three months ending in September, up from a loss of $17 billion, or $3.88 per share, a year earlier. Revenue climbed 3% from last year to $13.7 billion.

    Stock in the company rose nearly 8% in after-hours trading to $41.10, adding to strong gains since the United States invested in the summer.

    Recently installed CEO Lip-Bu Tan has been slashing thousands of jobs and mothballing projects to shore up the company’s finances and better compete with domestic and foreign rivals that have since overtaken it.

    President Donald Trump announced in August that the U.S. government would take a 10% stake in the Intel as part of his effort to bolster companies deemed vital to national security. It was a startling move for a Republican leader, bucking the party’s long-held belief that governments shouldn’t try to pick corporate winners and losers with taxpayer money.

    Intel handed over the shares in exchange for nearly $9 billion that had already been granted to it under the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. Intel had agreed to make major investments in U.S. manufacturing facilities in exchange for the funds.

    Intel also received $5 billion from rival Nvidia in September. Earlier this year, it received $2 billion from Japanese technology giant SoftBank.

    Founded in 1968 at the start of the personal computer revolution, Intel missed the shift to mobile computing triggered by Apple’s 2007 release of the iPhone. The company’s troubles have been magnified since then by the advent of artificial intelligence — a booming field where Nvidia’s chips have become tech’s hottest commodity.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • NVIDIA shows off its first Blackwell wafer manufactured in the US

    [ad_1]

    NVIDIA has taken a big step towards strengthening its domestic chip manufacturing, revealing the first Blackwell wafer made in the US. The hardware company assembled the wafer, which is the base material for NVIDIA’s AI chips, in TSMC’s semiconductor manufacturing facility in Phoenix, Arizona.

    NVIDIA revealed its Blackwell platform last year, boasting a goal of revolutionizing the AI industry through tech giants like Amazon, Google, OpenAI and others who already committed to adopting the next-gen architecture. NVIDIA said the latest platform was more powerful and translated to 25x less cost and energy consumption compared to its predecessor. Now that Blackwell wafers can be made at the TSMC plant, NVIDIA can better insulate itself from the ever-evolving tariff situation and geopolitical tensions.

    “It’s the very first time in recent American history that the single most important chip is being manufactured here in the United States by the most advanced fab, by TSMC, here in the United States,” Jensen Huang, NVIDIA’s founder and CEO, said at the celebration event.

    With NVIDIA’s Blackwell architecture ready for the volume production stage, the company is still working on expanding its manufacturing footprint across the US. Earlier this year, NVIDIA said it had plans to funnel half a trillion dollars towards building AI infrastructure in the US through partnerships with TSMC, Foxconn and other companies.

    [ad_2]

    Jackson Chen

    Source link

  • Trump says the US has secured $17 trillion in new investments. The real number is likely much less

    [ad_1]

    WASHINGTON (AP) — The economic boom promised by President Donald Trump centers on a single number: $17 trillion.

    That’s the sum of new investments that Trump claims to have generated with his tariffs, income tax cuts and aggressive salesmanship of CEOs, financiers, tech titans, prime ministers, presidents and other rulers. The $17 trillion is supposed to fund new factories, new technologies, more jobs, higher incomes and faster economic growth.

    “Under eight months of Trump, we’ve already secured commitments of $17 trillion coming in,” the president said in a speech last month. “There’s never been any country that’s done anything like that.”

    But based on statements from various companies, foreign countries and the White House’s own website, that figure appears to be exaggerated, highly speculative and far higher than the actual sum. The White House website lists total investments at $8.8 trillion, though that figure appears to be padded with some investment commitments made during Joe Biden’s presidency.

    The White House didn’t lay out the math after multiple requests as to how Trump calculated $17 trillion in investment commitments. But the issue goes beyond Trump’s hyperbolic talk to his belief that the brute force of tariffs and shaming of companies can deliver economic results, a strategy that could go sideways for him politically if the tough talk fails to translate into more jobs and higher incomes.

    Just 37% of U.S. adults approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, according to a September poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs. That’s down from a peak of 56% in early 2020 during Trump’s first term — a memory he relied upon when courting voters in last year’s election.

    Adam Posen, president of the Peterson Institute of International Economics, said the public commitments announced by Trump do represent a “meaningful increase” — but one that amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars, not trillions. Even then, that comes with long-term costs as countries might be less inclined to invest with the U.S. after being threatened to do so.

    “It is a national security mistake because you’re turning allies into colonies of a sort — you’re forcibly extracting from them things that they don’t see as entirely in their interest,” Posen said. “Twisting the arms of governments to then twist the arms of their own businesses is not going to get you the payoff you want.”

    Trump banking on foreign countries making good on promises

    The Trump administration is betting that tariffs are an effective tool to prod other countries and international companies to invest in the United States, a big stick that other administrations failed to wield. Trump’s pitch to voters is that he will play a role in directly managing the investment commitments made by foreign countries — and that the allocation of that money starting next year will revive what has been a flagging job market.

    “The difference between hypothetical investments and ground being broken on new factories and facilities is good leadership and sound policy,” said White House spokesman Kush Desai.

    The White House said that Japan will invest $1 trillion, largely at Trump’s direction. The European Union will commit $600 billion. The United Arab Emirates made commitments of $1.4 trillion over 10 years. Qatar pledged $1.2 trillion. Saudi Arabia intends to pony up $600 billion, India $500 billion and South Korea $450 billion, among others.

    The challenge is the precise terms of those investments have yet to be fully codified and released to the public, and some numbers are under dispute, potentially fuzzy math or, in the case of Qatar, more than five times the annual gross domestic product of the entire country. The White House maintains that Qatar is good for the money because it produces oil.

    South Korea already has misgivings about its investment commitment, which is $100 billion lower than what the White House claims, after immigration agents raided a Hyundai plant under construction in Georgia and arrested Korean citizens. There are also concerns that an investment that large without a better way to exchange currencies with the U.S. could hurt South Korea’s economy.

    “From what I’ve seen, these commitments are worth about as much as the paper they’re not written down on,” said Jared Bernstein, who was the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Biden White House.

    As for the $600 billion committed by European companies, that’s based on those businesses having “expressed interest” and having stated “intentions” to do so through 2029 rather than an overt concession, according to European Union documents.

    Still too soon to see any investment impact in overall economy

    So far, there has yet to be a notable boost in business investment as a percentage of U.S. gross domestic product. As a share of the overall economy, business investment during the first six months of Trump’s presidency has been consistently bouncing around 14%, just as it was before the pandemic.

    But economists also note that Trump is double-counting and relying on investments that were initially announced during the Biden administration or investments that were already likely to occur because of the artificial intelligence build out.

    For example, the White House lists a $16 billion investment by computer chipmaker Global Foundries. But of that sum, more than $13 billion was announced during the Biden administration and supported by $1.6 billion in grants by the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, as well as other state and federal incentives.

    Similarly, the White House is banking on $200 billion being invested by the chipmaker Micron, but at least $120 billion of that was announced during the Biden era.

    ‘The tariffs played a big role’

    For their part, White House officials largely credit Trump’s tariffs — like those imposed on Oct. 1 on kitchen cabinets, large trucks and pharmaceutical drugs — for forcing companies to make investments in the U.S., saying that the risk of additional import taxes if countries and companies fail to deliver on their promises will ensure that the promised cash comes into the economy.

    On Tuesday, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla endorsed this approach after his pharmaceutical drug company received a three-year grace period on tariffs and announced $70 billion in investments in the U.S.

    “The president was absolutely right,” Bourla said. “Tariffs is the most powerful tool to motivate behaviors.”

    “The tariffs played a big role,” Trump added.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Taiwanese chipmaker TSMC sees nearly 40% jump in its net profit thanks to the AI boom

    [ad_1]

    Taiwan’s leading computer chip maker, TSMC, has reported its net profit surged nearly 40% in the last quarter, boosted by the surge in use of artificial intelligence

    HONG KONG — HONG KONG (AP) — Taiwan’s leading computer chip maker, TSMC, said Thursday that its net profit surged nearly 40% in the last quarter, boosted by the surge in use of artificial intelligence.

    Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. is the world’s biggest semiconductor manufacturer. It reported a net profit of a record 452.3 billion new Taiwan dollars ($15 billion) in the July-September quarter, higher than analysts’ forecasts.

    The company earlier said its revenue jumped 30% year-on-year in the last quarter.

    TSMC has been building chip fabrication plants in the United States and Japan to help hedge against risks from China-U.S. trade tensions. The chipmaker is a major supplier to companies such as Apple and Nvidia.

    “Demand for TSMC’s products is unyielding,” Morningstar analysts wrote in a note this month. “Given TSMC’s dominance, we doubt the company would be hindered if it faced tariffs on shipments to U.S. customers. We expect AI demand to stay resilient.”

    U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick proposed last month that computer chip production be divided 50-50 between Taiwan and the U.S. Taiwan — where the majority of global chip manufacturing is currently based — rejected that idea.

    The company has committed $100 billion in U.S. investments, including building new factories in Arizona, on top of $65 billion that it pledged earlier.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Oracle and AMD expand AI partnership to keep up with demand

    [ad_1]

    WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — Oracle and Advanced Micro Devices are expanding their partnership with the deployment of 50,000 AMD graphic processing units beginning in the third quarter of 2026 with further expansion to follow.

    The so-called AI “supercluster” is a massive, interconnected group of high-performance computers designed to work together as a single system.

    AMD shares jumped 3% before the bell Tuesday, while Oracle’s slipped 1.8%.

    The companies said that next-generation AI models are poised to outgrow the limits of current AI infrastructure.

    No dollar figures for what each company’s investment in the expanded partnership.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • OpenAI partners with Broadcom to design its own AI chips

    [ad_1]

    SAN FRANCISCO — SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — OpenAI said Monday it is working with chipmaker Broadcom to design its own artificial intelligence computer chips.

    The two California companies didn’t disclose the financial terms of the deal but said they will start deploying the new racks of customized “AI accelerators” late next year.

    It’s the latest big deal between OpenAI, maker of ChatGPT, and the companies building the chips and data centers required to power AI.

    OpenAI in recent weeks has announced partnerships with chipmakers Nvidia and AMD that will supply the AI startup with specialized chips for running its AI systems. OpenAI has also made big deals with Oracle, CoreWeave and other companies developing the data centers where those chips are housed.

    Many of the deals rely on circular financing, in which the companies are both investing in OpenAI and supplying the world’s most valuable startup with technology, fueling concerns about an AI bubble. OpenAI doesn’t yet turn a profit but says its flagship chatbot now has more than 800 million weekly users.

    OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the work to develop a custom chip began more than a year ago.

    “Developing our own accelerators adds to the broader ecosystem of partners all building the capacity required to push the frontier of AI to provide benefits to all humanity,” he said in a statement.

    Broadcom shares surged more than 9% on Monday after the morning announcement.

    Broadcom CEO Hock Tan said in a statement that “we are thrilled to co-develop and deploy 10 gigawatts of next generation accelerators and network systems to pave the way for the future of AI.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Trump says US has secured $17T in new investments. The number is likely much less.

    [ad_1]

    WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — The economic boom promised by President Donald Trump centers on a single number: $17 trillion.

    That’s the sum of new investments that Trump claims to have generated with his tariffs, income tax cuts and aggressive salesmanship of CEOs, financiers, tech titans, prime ministers, presidents and other rulers. The $17 trillion is supposed to fund new factories, new technologies, more jobs, higher incomes and faster economic growth.

    “Under eight months of Trump, we’ve already secured commitments of $17 trillion coming in,” the president said in a speech last month. “There’s never been any country that’s done anything like that.”

    But based on statements from various companies, foreign countries and the White House’s own website, that figure appears to be exaggerated, highly speculative and far higher than the actual sum. The White House website lists total investments at $8.8 trillion, though that figure appears to be padded with some investment commitments made during Joe Biden’s presidency.

    The White House didn’t lay out the math after multiple requests as to how Trump calculated $17 trillion in investment commitments. But the issue goes beyond Trump’s hyperbolic talk to his belief that the brute force of tariffs and shaming of companies can deliver economic results, a strategy that could go sideways for him politically if the tough talk fails to translate into more jobs and higher incomes.

    Just 37% of U.S. adults approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, according to a September poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs. That’s down from a peak of 56% in early 2020 during Trump’s first term — a memory he relied upon when courting voters in last year’s election.

    Adam Posen, president of the Peterson Institute of International Economics, said the public commitments announced by Trump do represent a “meaningful increase” — but one that amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars, not trillions. Even then, that comes with long-term costs as countries might be less inclined to invest with the U.S. after being threatened to do so.

    “It is a national security mistake because you’re turning allies into colonies of a sort — you’re forcibly extracting from them things that they don’t see as entirely in their interest,” Posen said. “Twisting the arms of governments to then twist the arms of their own businesses is not going to get you the payoff you want.”

    The Trump administration is betting that tariffs are an effective tool to prod other countries and international companies to invest in the United States, a big stick that other administrations failed to wield. Trump’s pitch to voters is that he will play a role in directly managing the investment commitments made by foreign countries — and that the allocation of that money starting next year will revive what has been a flagging job market.

    “The difference between hypothetical investments and ground being broken on new factories and facilities is good leadership and sound policy,” said White House spokesman Kush Desai.

    The White House said that Japan will invest $1 trillion, largely at Trump’s direction. The European Union will commit $600 billion. The United Arab Emirates made commitments of $1.4 trillion over 10 years. Qatar pledged $1.2 trillion. Saudi Arabia intends to pony up $600 billion, India $500 billion and South Korea $450 billion, among others.

    The challenge is the precise terms of those investments have yet to be fully codified and released to the public, and some numbers are under dispute, potentially fuzzy math or, in the case of Qatar, more than five times the annual gross domestic product of the entire country. The White House maintains that Qatar is good for the money because it produces oil.

    South Korea already has misgivings about its investment commitment, which is $100 billion lower than what the White House claims, after immigration agents raided a Hyundai plant under construction in Georgia and arrested Korean citizens. There are also concerns that an investment that large without a better way to exchange currencies with the U.S. could hurt South Korea’s economy.

    “From what I’ve seen, these commitments are worth about as much as the paper they’re not written down on,” said Jared Bernstein, who was the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Biden White House.

    As for the $600 billion committed by European companies, that’s based on those businesses having “expressed interest” and having stated “intentions” to do so through 2029 rather than an overt concession, according to European Union documents.

    So far, there has yet to be a notable boost in business investment as a percentage of U.S. gross domestic product. As a share of the overall economy, business investment during the first six months of Trump’s presidency has been consistently bouncing around 14%, just as it was before the pandemic.

    But economists also note that Trump is double-counting and relying on investments that were initially announced during the Biden administration or investments that were already likely to occur because of the artificial intelligence build out.

    For example, the White House lists a $16 billion investment by computer chipmaker Global Foundries. But of that sum, more than $13 billion was announced during the Biden administration and supported by $1.6 billion in grants by the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, as well as other state and federal incentives.

    Similarly, the White House is banking on $200 billion being invested by the chipmaker Micron, but at least $120 billion of that was announced during the Biden era.

    For their part, White House officials largely credit Trump’s tariffs — like those imposed on Oct. 1 on kitchen cabinets, large trucks and pharmaceutical drugs — for forcing companies to make investments in the U.S., saying that the risk of additional import taxes if countries and companies fail to deliver on their promises will ensure that the promised cash comes into the economy.

    On Tuesday, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla endorsed this approach after his pharmaceutical drug company received a three-year grace period on tariffs and announced $70 billion in investments in the U.S.

    “The president was absolutely right,” Bourla said. “Tariffs is the most powerful tool to motivate behaviors.”

    “The tariffs played a big role,” Trump added.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • OpenAI and chipmaker AMD sign chip supply partnership for AI infrastructure

    [ad_1]

    Semiconductor maker AMD will supply its chips to artificial intelligence company OpenAI as part of an agreement to team up on building artificial intelligence infrastructure, the companies said Monday.

    OpenAI will also get the option to buy as much as a 10% stake in AMD, according to a joint statement announcing the deal. It’s the latest deal for the ChatGPT maker as it races to beef up its AI computing resources.

    Under the terms of the deal, OpenAI will buy the latest version of the company’s high performance graphics chips, the Instinct MI450, which is expected to debut next year.

    The agreement calls for supplying 6 gigawatts of computing power for OpenAI’s “next generation” AI infrastructure, with the first batch of chips worth 1 gigawatt to be deployed in the second half of 2026.

    AMD also issued OpenAI with a warrant allowing the AI company to buy up to 160 million shares of AMD’s common stock. That amounts to about 10% of company based on AMD’s 1.6 billion outstanding shares. The warrant will vest based on two milestones tied to the amount of computing power deployed, as well as unspecified “share-price targets.”

    Shares of AMD spiked 25% before the opening bell Monday. Shares of Nvidia, which have repeatedly set new record-highs this year, fell slightly.

    “This partnership is a major step in building the compute capacity needed to realize AI’s full potential,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, said in a news release. “AMD’s leadership in high-performance chips will enable us to accelerate progress and bring the benefits of advanced AI to everyone faster.”

    The deal is a boost for Santa Clara, Calif.-based AMD, which has been left behind by rival Nvidia. But it also hints at OpenAI’s desire to diversify its supply chain away from Nvidia’s dominance. The AI boom has fuelled demand for Nvidia’s graphics processing chips, sending its shares soaring and making it the world’s most valuable company.

    Last month, OpenAI and Nvidia announced a $100 billion partnership that will add at least 10 gigawatts of data center computing power.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • OpenAI announces partnerships with South Korean chip giants over Stargate project

    [ad_1]

    SEOUL, South Korea — OpenAI and South Korean tech conglomerates Samsung and SK on Wednesday announced partnerships to provide chips and other solutions for Stargate, a $500 billion project aimed at building infrastructure tied to artificial intelligence.

    The announcements came after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman met with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and Korean corporate leaders in Seoul. Lee hailed the partnerships as a major opportunity for South Korea’s semiconductor industry to solidify its role in AI and create more jobs.

    The partnerships commit Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix — the world’s two largest makers of memory chips — to accelerate their production of advanced chips to meet OpenAI’s increasing memory demands for the Stargate initiative, according to the companies’ statements.

    The ChatGPT maker also reached separate agreements with SK Telecom, South Korea’s top wireless carrier, to explore building an AI data center in the country, dubbed “Stargate Korea,” and with other Samsung affiliates to collaborate on data center technologies and potentially expand local capacity.

    Samsung said the agreements between OpenAI, Samsung C&T, and Samsung Heavy Industries include a joint commitment to develop floating data centers, which potentially offer advantages over land-based centers by easing land scarcity, reducing cooling costs and cutting carbon emissions.

    “Korea has all the ingredients to be a global leader in AI — incredible tech talent, world-class infrastructure, strong government support, and a thriving AI ecosystem,” Altman said in a statement.

    Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong said the world is at a “pivotal moment with the advent of AI, and the industry must collaborate to effectively chart the future.”

    Stargate, a joint venture between OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle backed by U.S. President Donald Trump, aims for a significant expansion of computing infrastructure to support the development and delivery of AI products. The companies have committed to eventually invest up to $500 billion to build large-scale data centers and secure energy generation needed to further AI development.

    OpenAI said last week that its flagship AI data center in Texas will be joined by five others around the United States, including two more data center complexes in Texas, one in New Mexico, one in Ohio and another in a Midwest location it hasn’t yet disclosed.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Wall Street set to open higher after taking a break from its most recent rally a day earlier

    [ad_1]

    Wall Street was poised to open with small gains Wednesday, a day after markets took a break from their relentless record-breaking rally.

    Futures for the S&P 500 ticked up 0.1% before the bell, while Nasdaq futures rose 0.2%. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average were unchanged.

    Shares of Alibaba soared nearly 10% after the Chinese e-commerce giant announced a partnership with Nvidia and an expansion of data center operations into a handful of countries to bolster its artificial intelligence infrastructure. Alibaba is the latest in a string of companies announcing that they were plowing money into AI, many of which are also partnering with AI-chipmaker Nvidia.

    U.S. markets paused from their recent rally on Tuesday after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said stock prices were “fairly highly valued.”

    In his first public remarks since the Fed cut its main interest rate last week for the first time this year, Powell said that the Fed is stuck in an unusual position because worries about the job market are rising at the same time that inflation has stubbornly remained above its 2% target.

    Analysts said his comments reiterated his stance that there is no risk-free path.

    “Essentially the Fed Chairman confirmed what we already knew, which is that the central bank remains somewhat ‘between a rock and a hard place’ when it comes to managing the risks of rising inflation and falling employment,” said Tim Waterer, chief market analyst at KCM Trade.

    Fed officials have penciled in more cuts to rates through the end of this year and into next, but they are remaining wary because lower rates can also give inflation more fuel.

    An update Friday will show how much prices are rising for U.S. households based on the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation, and economists expect it to show a slight acceleration for last month.

    Elsewhere, in Europe at midday France’s CAC 40 slipped 0.6%, while the German DAX and Britain’s FTSE 100 each fell 0.2%.

    Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 recouped morning losses to finish 0.3% higher at 45,630.31. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 slipped 0.9% to 8,764.50. South Korea’s Kospi dropped 0.4% to 3,472.14. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.4% to 26,518.65, while the Shanghai Composite gained 0.8% to 3,853.64.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Asian shares climb after US stocks remained near record levels following rate cut

    [ad_1]

    Strong overnight gains have Wall Street poised to open at record highs Thursday following the Federal Reserve’s first interest rate cut in nine months.

    Futures for the S&P 500 rose 0.8% before the bell, while futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.7%. Nasdaq futures jumped 1.1%.

    Intel shares soared more than 28% after Nvidia announced it was investing $5 billion in the California chipmaker as part of a collaboration to ramp up custom data center and personal computer products. Nvidia shares rose 2.6%.

    Cracker Barrel shares slid 8.2% after the restaurant chain said that it expects lower sales and weaker customer traffic in the coming year as the controversy over its planned logo change continues to play out.

    In a conference call with investors on Wednesday, Cracker Barrel said traffic at its restaurants was down 1% in early August, before it announced it was adopting a more simplified logo that upset many of its loyal customers. The company eventually relented and went back to the old logo.

    Walt Disney shares were largely unchanged after the entertainment giant announced that its ABC television division had suspended Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show indefinitely after comments that he made about Charlie Kirk’s killing led a group of ABC-affiliated stations to say they would not air the show.

    Earlier in the day, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr called Kimmel’s comments “truly sick” and said his agency has a strong case for holding Kimmel, ABC and network parent Walt Disney Co. accountable for spreading misinformation.

    As expected on Wednesday, the Federal Reserve cut its main interest rate, but even more important was the set of projections that U.S. central bank officials published showing where they expect interest rates to go in upcoming years.

    That indicated the typical member sees the Fed cutting the federal funds rate two more times by the end of this year and once more in 2026.

    Markets initially rose after the rate cut announcement and projections, but quickly gave back gains after Fed Chair Jerome Powell stressed that the projections could change and warned against taking them as guarantees of future conditions.

    What’s making things difficult for the Fed is that the job market is slowing as inflation is remaining stubbornly high. The Fed is in charge of fixing both, but it has only one tool to do that. And helping one by moving interest rates often hurts the other in the short term.

    The Fed had been holding rates steady this year because of the threat that U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs will raise prices for all kinds of products. Inflation has so far refused to go back below the Fed’s 2% target, and Fed officials don’t see that happening for a few years.

    In midday European trading, Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC each climbed 1.1%. Britain’s FTSE 100 added 0.3% in cautious trading ahead of a Bank of England interest rate decision later in the day.

    Asian shares were mixed, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 closing nearly 1.2% to 45,303.43 as the Bank of Japan started its two-day policy meeting, with rates expected to be left unchanged.

    South Korea’s Kospi added 1.4% to 3,461.30, with chipmakers SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics among advancers.

    The Chinese markets were down. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng slipped nearly 1.4% to 26,544.85, while the Shanghai Composite index trimmed earlier gains, losing over 1.1% to 3,831.66.

    Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 dipped 0.8% to 8,745.20 with data released Thursday showing the jobless rate was unchanged at 4.2% in August, but headline employment fell by 5,400 while full-time jobs declined by 40,900.

    India’s BSE Sensex was up 0.1%, while Taiwan’s Taiex added 1.3%.

    ——-

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia to invest $5B in Intel; companies will work together on AI infrastructure, PCs

    [ad_1]

    NEW YORK — Nvidia, the world’s leading chipmaker, announced a new partnership on Thursday with struggling semiconductor company Intel.

    Nvidia and Intel will team up to work on custom data centers that form the backbone of artificial intelligence infrastructure as well as personal computer products, Nvidia said in a press release.

    Nvidia also said it’s investing $5 billion in the common stock of Intel, which has been struggling. The deal is subject to regulatory approvals.

    The agreement provides a lifeline for Intel, which was a Silicon Valley pioneer that enjoyed decades of growth as its processors powered the personal computer boom, but fell into a slump after missing the shift to the mobile computing era unleashed by the iPhone’s 2007 debut. Intel fell even farther behind in recent years amid the artificial intelligence boom that’s propelled Nvidia into the world’s most valuable company.

    In premarket trading, Intel shares soared 30%.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • How Huawei plans to outperform global tech leaders with less powerful chips

    [ad_1]

    BEIJING — China’s Huawei Technologies said Thursday that it would roll out the world’s most powerful AI computing clusters over the next two years as it seeks to outperform global leaders despite relying on less powerful domestic semiconductors.

    China is racing to develop its own technology as America restricts what can be sold to China, including its most advanced chips. At the same time, the Chinese government has reportedly told companies to stop buying some American chips as it seeks to transform China into a global tech leader and one that is less reliant on imported components.

    Huawei, at the forefront of efforts to develop home-grown technology, said at an annual customer event in Shanghai that it would launch new “superpods” in late 2026 and late 2027. That’s computer industry lingo for a group of interconnected computers that, in Huawei’s case, combines the power of thousands of chips.

    That immense power is needed to run models in the burgeoning field of artificial intelligence, an area of hot competition between the U.S. and China.

    “This is a significant milestone,” said Charlie Dai, a technology analyst at the research firm Forrester Research. “It signals a stronger push toward self-reliance and resilience in the face of export restrictions.”

    Huawei announced plans to release the Atlas 950 and 960 superpods over the next two years. Dozens of the “SuperPoDs,” as Huawei brands them, could be connected to form what Huawei said would be the world’s most powerful “SuperClusters.”

    The 950 and 960 are the most powerful superpods in the world and would remain so for years to come, a company news release said, based on product road maps from others in the industry.

    The challenge for China is how to keep pace with American competitors such as Open AI and Google without access to the world’s most powerful semiconductors, notably those from America’s market-leading Nvidia. The answer has been to use many more chips and develop the architecture to make them work well together.

    “Our strategy is to create a new computing architecture, and develop computing SuperPoDs and SuperClusters, to sustainably meet long-term demand for computing power,” Eric Xu, the current rotating chairman of Huawei, told the customer conference, according to a transcript provided by the company.

    Huawei, based in Shenzhen in southern China, also announced plans to launch new AI chips in its Ascend series over the next three years. The Atlas 950 and 960 superpods would be based on the Ascend 950 and 960 chips, due out in 2026 and 2027. A planned Ascend 970 chip could follow in 2028.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • China says Nvidia violated antimonopoly laws, according to preliminary investigation

    [ad_1]

    LONDON — Chinese regulators said Monday that a preliminary investigation found chipmaker Nvidia violated the country’s anti-monopoly laws.

    The State Administration for Market Regulation said in a one-sentence statement that it would carry out “further investigation” into Nvidia, the world’s leading semiconductor manufacturer.

    The statement said the investigation centered on Nvidia’s purchase of network and data transmission company Mellanox Technologies.

    Nvidia didn’t respond immediately to a request for comment.

    Regulators said last year that they were investigating the company for suspected violations stemming from the $6.9 billion acquisition of Mellanox in 2019.

    The decision ratchets up pressure on the U.S. as officials from Washington hold trade talks with Beijing’s representatives in Spain this week.

    Beijing has been tightening scrutiny of the U.S. chip industry. On Saturday, China’s Ministry of Commerce said it was carrying out an anti-dumping investigation into certain analog IC chips imported from the U.S., including commodity chips that are commonly made by companies such as Texas Instruments and ON Semiconductor.

    U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is meeting Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Madrid for negotiations on tariffs and national security issues related to the ownership of social media platform TikTok. The talks were scheduled from Sunday to Wednesday.

    It’s the fourth round of discussions after meetings in London, Geneva and Stockholm. The two governments have agreed to several 90-day pauses on a series of increasing reciprocal tariffs, staving off an all-out trade war.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • China launches probes targeting US semiconductors ahead of Madrid trade talks

    [ad_1]

    TAIPEI, Taiwan — China launched two probes targeting the U.S. semiconductor sector Saturday ahead of talks between the two nations in Spain this week on trade, national security and the ownership of social media platform TikTok.

    China’s Ministry of Commerce announced an anti-dumping investigation into certain analog IC chips imported from the U.S. The investigation will target some commodity interface IC chips and gate driver IC chips, which are commonly made by U.S. companies such as Texas Instruments and ON Semiconductor.

    The ministry separately announced an anti-discrimination probe into U.S. measures against China’s chip sector.

    U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is set to meet Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Madrid between Sunday and Wednesday, He’s office said.

    U.S. measures such as export curbs and tariffs “constitute the containment and suppression of China’s development of high-tech industries” such as advanced computer chips and artificial intelligence, a Chinese commerce ministry spokesperson said.

    The announcements of the probes follow the U.S. on Friday adding 23 Chinese companies to an “entity list” of businesses that will face restrictions for allegedly acting against U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. The list includes two Chinese companies accused of acquiring chipmaking equipment for major Chinese chipmaker SMIC.

    The meetings between Bessent and He in Madrid will be the latest in a series of negotiations aimed at reducing trade tensions and postponing the enactment of higher tariffs on each other’s goods.

    U.S. and Chinese counterparts previously held discussions in Geneva in May, London in June and Stockholm in July. The two governments have agreed to several 90-day pauses on a series of increasing reciprocal tariffs, staving off an all-out trade war.

    Bessent described the talks during the last round in Stockholm as “very fulsome.”

    “We just need to de-risk with certain, strategic industries, whether it’s the rare earths, semiconductors, medicines, and we talked about what we could do together to get into balance within the relationship,” Bessent said at the time.

    U.S. President Donald Trump and former President Joe Biden placed curbs on China’s access to advanced semiconductors including restrictions on the sale of chipmaking equipment to the country. While Washington cites national security concerns, China argues the curbs are part of a U.S. strategy to contain its growth.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Asian shares are mostly up after US stocks inch to more records as inflation slows

    [ad_1]

    MANILA, Philippines — World shares were mostly higher Thursday, buoyed by gains of tech-related stocks after Wall Street inched to more records following a surprisingly encouraging report on inflation and a stunning forecast for growth from Oracle because of the artificial intelligence boom.

    In early European trading, Germany’s DAX was nearly flat at 23,631.29. Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 0.4% to 9,259.17, while France’s CAC 40 climbed 0.5% to 7,803.52.

    In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 added 1.2% to 44,372.50, with tech investment company SoftBank Group’s shares jumping 8.3% in a second straight day of gains.

    Data released Thursday showed Japan’s producer prices rose 2.7% year-on-year in August from a 2.5% rise the previous month, in line with market expectations. The higher cost of food, transport equipment and machinery contributed to the rise in prices.

    In Chinese markets, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index slid 0.4% to 26,086.32 while the Shanghai Composite index rose 1.7% to 3,875.31.

    Shares of chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp added more than 6%, while Hua Hong Semiconductor rose 3.8%. Cambricon Technologies, often called China’s Nvidia, climbed 9%.

    South Korea’s Kospi climbed 0.9% to 3,344.20 while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was down 0.3% to 8,805.00. India’s BSE Sensex added nearly 0.2% while Taiwan’s Taiex rose 0.1%, trimming earlier gains.

    The future for the S&P 500 rose 0.1% while that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average added less than 0.1%.

    “Asia’s Thursday tape was the kind of market that looks lively from a distance but flat when you press your nose against the glass. After Wall Street’s record sprint, traders in Tokyo and Seoul tried to carry the baton. Still, Hong Kong and Sydney promptly fumbled it, leaving the MSCI Asia-Pacific index pacing on the spot after five straight daily advances,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a market commentary.

    On Wall Street, the S&P 500 rose 0.3% on Wednesday and set an all-time high for a second straight day. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 220 points, or 0.5%, and the Nasdaq composite edged up by less than 0.1% after both set records the day before.

    Stocks have hit records in large part because Wall Street is expecting the economy to pull off a delicate balancing act: slowing enough to convince the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates, but not so much that it causes a recession, all while inflation remains under control.

    Many things must go right for that to happen, and an encouraging signal came from a report Wednesday saying inflation at the U.S. wholesale level unexpectedly slowed in August.

    A potentially more important report is coming Thursday, which will show how bad inflation has been for U.S. households.

    Traders were already convinced the Fed will deliver its first cut to interest rates of the year at its next meeting, but they need inflation data until then to be mild enough not to derail those expectations.

    On Wall Street, tech stocks led the way after Oracle said AI-related demand is set to send its revenue surging. Oracle stock leaped 35.9% for its best day since 1992, even though it also reported results for the latest quarter that came up just shy of analysts’ expectations.

    Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., which makes chips used in AI and other computing, saw its stock that trades in the U.S. climb 3.8% after it said its revenue jumped nearly 34% in August from a year earlier.

    On the losing side of Wall Street was Apple, whose drop of 3.2% helped drag the Dow lower and was the heaviest single weight on the S&P 500. Some analysts said its unveiling of new iPhones the day before contained no surprises and may not drive much growth in demand.

    In other dealings Thursday, benchmark U.S. crude shed 11 cents to $63.56 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, lost 8 cents to $67.41 per barrel.

    The U.S. dollar rose to 147.88 yen from 147.36 yen. The euro slid to $1.1687 from $1.1704.

    ___

    AP Business Writers Stan Choe in New York contributed to this report.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • ASML invests $1.5B in French AI startup Mistral, forming European tech alliance

    [ad_1]

    ASML, a leading Dutch chipmaking equipment maker, is investing 1.3 billion euros ($1.5 billion) into French AI startup Mistral AI

    LONDON — ASML, a leading Dutch maker of chipmaking gear, is investing 1.3 billion euros ($1.5 billion) into French artificial intelligence startup Mistral AI, the two said on Tuesday, announcing a partnership between two of Europe’s top technology companies.

    ASML Holding, based in Veldhoven, Netherlands, holds an important role in the global tech industry because it makes equipment used to manufacture semiconductors, including the most advanced microchips used for cutting-edge AI systems.

    Mistral was founded two years ago in Paris by former researchers at Google DeepMind and Meta Platforms and quickly became a European tech darling.

    The partnership underscores Europe’s efforts to reduce exposure to American technology. President Donald Trump’s increasingly hostile attitude to European Union tech regulations has fueled debate about whether the continent is too dependent on services provided by U.S. tech companies such as cloud computing and mobile operating systems.

    Mistral makes the Le Chat chatbot but it has struggled to keep up with American AI companies like ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, and Chinese rivals like DeepSeek.

    ASML’s chipmaking equipment can cost hundreds of millions of dollars but the U.S. government has blocked it from selling its most advanced machines to China.

    The deal gives ASML an 11% stake in Mistral, and values the startup at about 11.7 billion euros. The 1.3 billion euro investment is part of a larger funding round worth 1.7 billion euros, which also involves venture capital firms and chipmaker Nvidia.

    Mistral CEO Arthur Mensch said in a press release that the alliance combines Mistral’s “frontier AI expertise with ASML’s unmatched industrial leadership and most sophisticated engineering capabilities.”

    “Together, we will accelerate technological progress across the global semiconductor and AI value chain,” Mensch said.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Asian shares are mixed after US stocks creep higher ahead of Nvidia earnings report

    [ad_1]

    MANILA, Philippines — Asian shares were mixed Thursday after modest gains on Wall Street lifted the S&P 500 to another all-time high ahead of computer chip maker Nvidia’s highly anticipated earnings report.

    U.S. futures also were mixed and oil prices declined.

    In China, shares in computer chip maker Cambricon Technologies surged 7.1% to 1,469.99 yuan ($205.60), becoming the priciest stock on Shanghai’s exchange as it surpassed Kweichou Moutai’s stock, which was unchanged at 1,449 yuan ($202.51) a share. Cambricon’s shares have jumped after it reported its revenue and profit soared in the first half of the year, helped by the Chinese government’s support for domestic semiconductor makers.

    The Shanghai Composite index edged less than 0.1% higher to 3,803.08. It has been trading near decade-high levels on heavy buying by institutional investors.

    Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 0.7% to 25,035.78, led by losses for technology companies like food delivery company Meituan. Its shares dropped 10.3%, while e-commerce giant JD.com declined 3.5%. Such companies have seen demand sag as Chinese consumers cut back on spending.

    Japan’s Nikkei 225 added 0.6% to 42,755.61. It has been trading near record levels, despite friction with Washington over a preliminary trade agreement that has yet to be finalized. Top trade envoy Ryohei Akazawa abruptly postponed a trip to the U.S. capital planned for Thursday in the latest sign of trouble over the deal setting tariffs on Japanese exports at 15%, a policy that has yet to come into effect.

    South Korea’s Kospi climbed 0.4% to 3,200.71 after the Bank of Korea kept its policy rate unchanged at 2.5% for its second straight meeting.

    Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 edged 0.1% higher to 8,970.30. India’s BSE Sensex fell 1.1%, reopening following a public holiday after higher U.S. tariffs on the country’s exports took effect on Wednesday.

    Taiwan’s TAIEX shed 0.7%.

    Stock indexes in Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur were both 0.4% higher, while that in Manila was down 0.5% near midday.

    On Wednesday, the S&P 500 rose 0.2%, nudging past the record high it set two weeks ago to close at 6,481.40.

    The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.3% to 45,565.23, and the Nasdaq composite closed 0.2% higher at 21,590.14.

    Technology companies led the way higher, outweighing declines in communication services and other sectors.

    After the market closed, Nvidia’s quarterly report showed its earnings and revenue topped Wall Street analysts’ forecasts, though the company noted that sales of its artificial intelligence chipsets rose at a slower pace than analysts anticipated. The stock fell 3.2% in after-hours trading after having slipped 0.1% during the regular session.

    Investors consider Nvidia a barometer for the strength of the boom in artificial intelligence because the company makes most of the chips that power the technology. Its heavy weighting also gives Nvidia outsized influence as a bellwether for the broader market.

    Trading on Wall Street was off to an uneven start this week following big gains last week on hopes for interest rate cuts from the Fed.

    Markets have been subdued since Trump escalated his fight with the central bank by trying to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. Cook’s lawyer said she’ll sue Trump’s administration to try to stop him.

    Trump has been feuding with the central bank over its cautious interest rate policy. The Fed has held rates steady since late 2024 over worries that Trump’s unpredictable tariff policies will reignite inflation.

    In other dealings early Thursday, U.S. benchmark crude dropped 52 cents to $63.63 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, declined 49 cents to $66.95 per barrel.

    The dollar fell to 147.19 Japanese yen early Thursday, down from 147.40 yen. The euro rose to $1.1641 from $1.1640.

    ___ AP Business Writer Alex Veiga contributed.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Trump says Intel agreed to give US a stake in its company

    [ad_1]

    WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said that Intel has agreed to give the U.S. government a 10% stake in its business.

    Speaking with reporters on Friday, Trump said the deal came out of a meeting last week with Intel CEO Lip Bu Tan — which came days after the president called for Tan to resign over his past ties to China.

    “I said, I think it would be good having the United States as your partner,” Trump said. “He agreed, and they’ve agreed to do it.”

    Intel did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the agreement.

    The struggling Silicon Valley chipmaker has a market cap of just over $100 billion. The agreement comes just after Japanese technology giant SoftBank Group disclosed Monday that it is accumulating its 2% stake in Intel.

    The official announcement is expected to come later Friday, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly ahead of an announcement and spoke on condition of anonymity.

    The Trump administration has been in talks to secure a 10% stake in Intel in exchange for converting government grants that were pledged to Intel under President Joe Biden. If the deal is completed, the U.S. government would become one of Intel’s largest shareholders and blur the traditional lines separating the public sector and private sector in a country that remains the world’s largest economy.

    In his second term, Trump has been leveraging his power to reprogram the operations of major computer chip companies. The administration is requiring Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices, two companies whose chips are helping to power the craze around artificial intelligence, to pay a 15% commission on their sales of chips in China in exchange for export licenses.

    Trump’s interest in Intel is also being driven by his desire to boost chip production in the U.S., which has been a focal point of the trade war that he has been waging throughout the world. By lessening the country’s dependence on chips manufactured overseas, the president believes the U.S. will be better positioned to maintain its technological lead on China in the race to create artificial intelligence.

    That’s what the president said August 7 in an unequivocal post calling for Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan to resign less than five months after the Santa Clara, California, company hired him. The demand was triggered by reports raising national security concerns about Tan’s past investments in Chinese tech companies while he was a venture capitalist. But Trump backed off after Tan professed his allegiance to the U.S. in a public letter to Intel employees and went to the White House to meet with the president, who applauded the Intel CEO for having an “amazing story.”

    The company isn’t commenting about the possibility of the U.S. government becoming a major shareholder, but Intel may have little choice because it is currently dealing from a position of weakness. After enjoying decades of growth while its processors powered the personal computer boom, the company fell into a slump after missing the shift to the mobile computing era unleashed by the iPhone’s 2007 debut.

    Intel has fallen even farther behind in recent years during an artificial intelligence craze that has been a boon for Nvidia and AMD. The company lost nearly $19 billion last year and another $3.7 billion in the first six months of this year, prompting Tan to undertake a cost-cutting spree. By the end of this year, Tan expects Intel to have about 75,000 workers, a 25% reduction from the end of last year.

    Although rare, it’s not unprecedented for the U.S. government to become a significant shareholder in a prominent company. One of the most notable instances occurred during the Great Recession in 2008 when the government injected nearly $50 billion into General Motors in return for a roughly 60% stake in the automaker at a time it was on the verge of bankruptcy. The government ended up with a roughly $10 billion loss after it sold its stock in GM.

    U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNBC during a Tuesday interview that the government has no intention of meddling in Intel’s business, and will have its hands tied by holding non-voting shares in the company. But some analysts wonder if the Trump administration’s financial ties to Intel might prod more companies looking to curry favor with the president to increase their orders for the company’s chips.

    Intel was among the biggest beneficiaries of the Biden administration’s CHIPS and Science Act, but it hasn’t been able to revive its fortunes while falling behind on construction projects spawned by the program.

    The company has received about $2.2 billion of the $7.8 billion pledged under the incentives program — money that Lutnick derided as a “giveaway” that would better serve U.S. taxpayers if it’s turned into Intel stock. “We think America should get the benefit of the bar

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia’s CEO says it’s in talks with Trump administration on a new chip for China

    [ad_1]

    BANGKOK (AP) — Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said Friday that the company is discussing a potential new computer chip designed for China with the Trump administration.

    Huang was asked about a possible “B30A” semiconductor for artificial intelligence data centers for China while on a visit to Taiwan, where he was meeting Nvidia’s key manufacturing partner, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp., the world’s largest chip maker.

    “I’m offering a new product to China for … AI data centers, the follow-on to H20,” Huang said. But he added that “That’s not our decision to make. It’s up to, of course, the United States government. And we’re in dialogue with them, but it’s too soon to know.”

    Such chips are graphics processing units, or GPUs, a type of device used to build and update a range of AI systems. But they are less powerful than Nvidia’s top semiconductors today, which cannot be sold to China due to U.S. national security restrictions.

    The B30A, based on California-based Nvidia’s specialized Blackwell technology, is reported to operate at about half the speed of Nvidia’s main B300 chips.

    Huang praised the the Trump administration for recently approving sales of Nvidia’s H20 chips to China after such business was suspended in April, with the proviso that the company must pay a 15% tax to the U.S. government on those sales. Chip maker Advanced Micro Devices, or AMD, was told to pay the same tax on its sales of its MI380 chips to China.

    As part of broader trade talks, Beijing and Washington recently agreed to pull back some non-tariff restrictions. China approved more permits for rare earth magnets to be exported to the U.S., while Washington lifted curbs on chip design software and jet engines. After lobbying by Huang, it also allowed sales of the H20 chips to go through.

    Huang did not comment directly on the tax when asked but said Nvidia appreciated being able to sell H20s to China.

    He said such sales pose no security risk for the United States. Nvidia is also speaking with Beijing to reassure Chinese authorities that those chips do not pose a “backdoor” security risk, Huang said.

    “We have made very clear and put to rest that H20 has no security backdoors. There are no such things. There never has. And so hopefully the response that we’ve given to the Chinese government will be sufficient,” he said.

    The Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s internet watchdog, recently posted a notice on its website referring to alleged “serious security issues” with Nvidia’s computer chips.

    It said U.S. experts on AI had said such chips have “mature tracking and location and remote shutdown technologies” and Nvidia had been asked to explain any such risks and provide documentation about the issue.

    Huang said Nvidia was surprised by the accusation and was discussing the issue with Beijing.

    “As you know, they requested and urged us to secure licenses for the H20s for some time. And I’ve worked quite hard to help them secure the licenses. And so hopefully this will be resolved,” Huang said.

    Unconfirmed reports said Chinese authorities were also unhappy over comments by U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggesting the U.S. was only selling outdated chips to China.

    Speaking on CNBC, Lutnick said the U.S. strategy was to keep China reliant on American chip technology.

    “We don’t sell them our best stuff,” he said. “Not our second best stuff. Not even our third best, but I think fourth best is where we’ve come out that we’re cool,” he said.

    China’s ruling Communist Party has made self-reliance in advanced technology a strategic priority, though it still relies on foreign semiconductor knowhow for much of what it produces.

    ___

    AP Videojournalist Taijing Wu in Taipei contributed to this report.

    [ad_2]

    Source link