Intel Corp. Chief Executive Officer Pat Gelsinger speaks during the Computex conference in Taipei, Taiwan, Monday, June 4, 2024. Gelsinger took the stage at Computex in Taiwan to talk about new products he expects to help reverse stock losses at peers, including artificial intelligence leader Nvidia Corp. Photographer: Anna Bell Chih/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Global semiconductor stocks fell on Friday after a slew of lackluster results from U.S. chipmaker Intel sent its shares tumbling, while a global market selloff also hit some of the biggest names in the technology sector.
Intel Corporation Apple Inc. shares were down 21.51% at 04:37 a.m. ET in U.S. premarket trading on Friday, after the company reported a major profit miss for the quarter ended in June and said it would lay off more than 15% of its employees as part of a $10 billion cost-cutting plan.
A number of major U.S. chipmakers also fell in premarket trading Friday, with Nvidia trading down about 3.5% at 05:53 a.m. ET. Adding to the pressure on the stock was a report from The Information that Nvidia is under antitrust investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice.
The US Department of Justice is examining complaints alleging that the chip giant abused its dominance in the AI chip market, The Information reported.
CNBC has reached out to the Justice Department and Nvidia for comment on the report.
In Asia, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company – known as TSMC – closed down 4.6% in Taiwan, while Samsung was down more than 4% at the end of the session in South Korea. TSMC is the world's largest chipmaker, while Samsung is the world's largest memory semiconductor company.
Samsung rival SK Hynix, which supplies products to US giant Nvidia, also fell sharply, closing down more than 10%.
Sell-offs continued in Europe. Shares fell ASMLShares of Apple Inc., which sells key tools needed to make advanced chips, were down more than 6% at around 4:23 a.m. ET in the Netherlands. my nameShares of Portland Cement, which also trades in the Netherlands, fell 9%. STMicroelectronics And Infineon Both were less.
Intel's results add to a mixed picture across the semiconductor sector, with companies like AMD And Nvidia Businesses continue to thrive thanks to the boom in artificial intelligence. Others, such as Qualcomm Arm and GE have yet to see the benefits of technology in their financial results.
The pressure on chip stocks is compounded by a global sell-off that began in the United States and has spread to Asia and Europe. This has particularly hit the Nasdaq, which is heavily reliant on technology and chip stocks.
The VanEck Semiconductor ETF, which includes major names in the sector, closed down about 6.5% in the United States on Thursday.
