Japanese and Korean Chip Stocks Nosedive
On September 1, chip stocks in the Japanese and Korean markets experienced a comprehensive sell-off. By the close of trading, Advantest Corp. had plummeted by 7.97%, Japanese chipmaker Renesas Electronics fell by 2.21%, WiMi Hologram Cloud plunged by 6.32%, SK Hynix dropped by 4.83%, and Samsung Electronics declined by 3.01%. Affected by this, the Japanese and Korean stock markets collectively retreated. By the close, the Nikkei 225 Index had fallen by 1.24%, and the Korea Composite Index had dropped by 1.35%.
Analysts pointed out that the sharp decline in Japanese and Korean chip stocks was primarily influenced by the sell-off in U.S. tech stocks the previous Friday. By the close of trading that day, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index had fallen by over 3%, with Marvell Technology plunging by more than 18%, Oracle dropping by 5.9%, and Nvidia, Broadcom, TSMC ADR, and AMD all falling by over 3%. Micron Technology, Applied Materials, ASML ADR, and Intel each declined by more than 2%.
Among these, Marvell Technology’s latest earnings report provided guidance that fell short of market expectations, sparking investor concerns about a potential slowdown in future performance growth for AI chip concept stocks.
Additionally, the "AI bellwether" Nvidia also revealed a warning signal. According to disclosures by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), nearly 40% of Nvidia’s revenue in the second fiscal quarter came from just two customers.
Specifically, "Customer A" accounted for 23% of total revenue, while "Customer B" accounted for 16%. This proportion is significantly higher than the same period last year, when the top two customers contributed 14% and 11% of sales, respectively. This disclosure has reignited market discussions about whether Nvidia is overly reliant on a few major customers, particularly cloud computing giants such as Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Oracle.
In its earnings report, Nvidia did not disclose the specific identities of Customer A and Customer B. Nvidia noted that these are direct customers, including original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), system integrators, or distributors who purchase chips directly from Nvidia. Indirect customers, such as cloud service providers or consumer internet companies, purchase Nvidia chips from these direct customers.
Wall Street analysts pointed out that while high revenue concentration in a few customers poses risks, these customers have ample cash reserves and substantial free cash flow. They are expected to continue making significant investments in data center construction in the coming years.
