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United States – Meta Platforms’ announcement that it will build its own cloud business and sell excess artificial-intelligence computing power triggered a sharp global sell-off in semiconductor shares on Wednesday. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index dropped 6.3%, leading declines in U.S. technology stocks and dragging the broader market lower, while the Nasdaq 100 fell 1.5%. South Korea’s KOSPI opened 5% down and hit a circuit breaker, highlighting how the reaction spread beyond Wall Street. Major chipmakers including Micron, AMD, NVIDIA, SanDisk, Applied Materials and Lam Research all registered steep losses, with Micron closing down 10.57% and SanDisk posting the biggest decline at 10.62%. Applied Materials and Lam Research each fell nearly 10%, and AMD slid 6.8%, while NVIDIA lost 1%, reversing part of this year’s gains in the sector. United States – In contrast to the slump in semiconductor stocks, Meta’s shares surged 8.81%, marking the company’s strongest single-day rise in six months. Investors viewed Meta’s move as a sign that heavy capital spending by large cloud and AI infrastructure providers may have reached a plateau, easing concerns over runaway investment in data centers and chips. Meta previously told investors it plans to spend up to $145 billion on capital expenditures in 2024, largely on data centers and AI processors, and the new strategy would allow it to generate revenue from unused computing capacity. The initiative positions Meta in direct competition with established AI cloud providers such as Amazon, Microsoft, Google and CoreWeave. JPMorgan analyst Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou said the strong outperformance of semiconductor stocks compared with AI cloud companies “appears somewhat unsustainable in the long run,” underscoring a shift in market sentiment toward infrastructure-heavy tech platforms.

By James Porter | JQJO News