Here's Why the VanEck Semiconductor ETF Soared in May And Is a Great Way to Play AI Spending - The Motley Fool

In May 2024, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) surged 18.2%, significantly outperforming typical ETF benchmarks. This surge was driven by accelerating momentum in artificial intelligence (AI) spendin... Read original →

The shift toward CPU-centric AI inference is triggering a fundamental reconfiguration of the semiconductor stack. While TSMC (Taiwan, China) maintains dominance in 3nm and EUV, rising CPU demand is reshaping packaging, memory bandwidth, and interconnect architectures. U.S. export controls on advanced equipment have inflated Intel’s and AMD’s domestic manufacturing costs, yet Qualcomm’s ARM-based AI PC push offers a supply-chain-resilient alternative. In response to NVIDIA’s training hegemony, Intel is countering with Gaudi 3 and Lunar Lake, while AMD bets on MI300X+Zen5 heterogeneity for hybrid workloads. Over the next 12–24 months, as large language models migrate to edge devices, fused low-power CPUs and NPUs will likely set new architectural norms—exposing the fragility of GPU-only portfolios and reinforcing the strategic value of broad-exposure ETFs like SMH.