Stocks sink but TSMC, Samsung bullish on AI at major trade show

Senior executives from two of the world’s most important chipmakers, Taiwan’s TSMC and South Korea’s Samsung Electronics, offered bullish outlooks for artificial intelligence at a major trade show on Wednesday even as their stocks tanked on a fevered day on the markets.

TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, dropped as much as 5.5% while Samsung Electronics, the world’s biggest maker of memory chips, closed down 3.5%.

The losses came after global AI darling Nvidia was sold heavily overnight as investors reined in their optimism about the AI sector, as well as U.S. economic growth.

Speaking to the Semicon Taiwan industry forum in Taipei, Y.J. Mii, TSMC Executive Vice President and Co-Chief Operating Officer, said AI remained a major growth driver even if it would cause many jobs globally to change or disappear.

“I think in general we believe AI is a huge opportunity for all of us in this industry,” he said.

“We think there is good opportunity for growth. From an AI accelerator point of view probably for the next couple of years at least a 50% compound growth rate is achievable. As for longer term, we can wait to see how it goes.”

Sitting next to him on stage, Lee Jung-Bae, president of Samsung Electronics’ memory chip business, said things were only getting started with AI and it was natural to have bumps on the road.

“For the AI, I really think that we are at the beginning and there might be some ups and downs and there might be some chasms, but quite steady in the longer term,” he said.

“I believe, as far as the AI helps human beings I think it’s going to be a new revolution for changing our everyday lives,” he added. “I am cautiously optimistic for AI.”

In July, Samsung reported its highest operating profit since the third quarter of 2022, spurred by the chip division returning to form as the tech giant’s cash cow after a slump caused by weak post-pandemic demand for gadgets that use the chips.

The same month, TSMC raised its full-year revenue forecast given surging demand for AI chips.