Hold Semiconductor Stocks, Advises Veteran Manager - 조선일보

As the Korean stock market approaches June, individual investors are grappling with whether to hold or sell semiconductor stocks amid significant gains by leaders like Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix... Read original →

AI-driven compute demand is triggering a deep restructuring of the semiconductor tech stack: EUV scarcity, once confined to logic chips, now extends to HBM memory production. Samsung and SK Hynix’s rush to adopt High-NA EUV sharply raises capex barriers, squeezing out second-tier players. Geopolitical compliance costs are surging—U.S. export controls and EU Chips Act subsidies mandate localized capacity, forcing TSMC (Taiwan, China) and Korean firms into costly dual-site fab strategies that strain operating leverage. In response to Samsung’s integrated memory-foundry push into AI ASICs, TSMC may accelerate CoWoS advanced packaging capacity to defend its pricing moat. Over the next 18 months, the sector will decouple between valuation corrections and real AI revenue realization. Only firms with genuine tech moats and locked-in customer relationships will endure. Current high valuations mark not a peak, but the onset of AI infrastructure’s long-tail investment cycle.