AI ignites bullish craze, chip stocks record ninth consecutive rise! Philadelphia Semiconductor Index sets its longest continuous rise since 2017.

As of Tuesday's close, one of the core drivers of the "long-term bull market in US stocks" since 2023 - chip stocks, closed strongly. The sector even achieved its longest continuous uptrend in nearly eight years, with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR (TSM.US) and global memory chip leader Micron (MU.US) hitting historical highs this week. US chip stocks have seen their longest continuous uptrend period since 2017, driven by the growth wave of artificial intelligence and the enthusiastic AI investment sentiment. Looking ahead to future trends, according to research reports on the chip market from Wall Street financial giant Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. and the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization (WSTS), under the unprecedented global AI investment boom, chip stocks may continue to be one of the most promising sectors in the US stock market from a long-term investment perspective. In the recent global chip stock "super bull market", especially with the surging trend of semiconductor/chip stocks closely related to AI training/inference systems, Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.'s latest semiconductor industry report has added fuel to the already passionate AI bullish sentiment. Following the Communacopia + Technology conference covering the top global semiconductor companies hosted by the institution, the Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. research team stated its continued belief in the "AI-driven structural bull market" in the semiconductor industry. As of Tuesday's close, the benchmark index of US chip stocks - the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, which investors also see as a "global barometer of chip stocks," rose by only 0.3%. However, this was the ninth consecutive trading day of gains for the index, marking the longest continuous uptrend since 2017. During these nine trading days, the index rose by 8.7%, with a year-to-date increase of 22%, significantly outperforming the nearly 16% increase in the Nasdaq 100 index during the same period. The chip stock fever continues to rise - the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index shows the longest continuous uptrend since 2017 Among the noteworthy component stocks of the index, as of Tuesday's close, Amkor (AMKR.US) saw a rise of over 5%, ON Semiconductor Corporation (ON.US) rose by 3%, Intel Corporation (INTC.US) rose by 2%, and Applied Materials (AMAT.US) rose by 1.5%. Despite NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US), the strongest leader in AI chips, falling by 1.6% in stock price, its year-to-date gain still exceeds 30%. Another popular chip stock that has hit historical highs this year, Broadcom Inc. (TSM.US), saw its stock price fall by 1.1%, but its increase since 2025 is a staggering 55%. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR reached a historical high on Tuesday, with its stock showing strong growth, ranking second only to Broadcom Inc. in this year's performance of US chip stocks. In the chip industry chain, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR is considered the "everlasting god" (YYDS). The booming demand for AI GPU and AI ASIC cannot do without Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR. With decades of chip-making technology accumulation in the field of chip manufacturing, and long-standing at the forefront of chip manufacturing technology improvement and innovation globally, leading in advanced processes and packaging technologies, and holding the majority of global chip outsourcing orders for a long time, especially orders for the most advanced processes of 5nm and below. The stock price of Micron Technology, Inc., a storage chip giant based in the United States, has been skyrocketing since September, benefiting from the continued strong demand for core storage chips closely related to AI training/inference systems, explosive growth in HBM storage system demand, and a wave of price increases for a series of data center storage chip products including enterprise SSD and DDR series. Micron's stock price has risen by 35% since September and hit a new all-time high earlier this week. Wall Street financial giant Citibank reaffirmed its "buy" rating on Micron Technology, Inc. and raised its target price from $140 to $175. Another financial giant, Mizuho, significantly raised Micron's target stock price from $155 to $182. With the "AI belief" sweeping the market, is the bull market in chip stocks far from over? "Almost everything we see in the construction of AI infrastructure and the entire technology sector is driven by stocks related to semiconductors," said Wayne Kaufman, chief market analyst at Phoenix Financial Services. He also added that Oracle Corporation's strong financial report in recent times and the over $100 billion AI infrastructure deal between Microsoft Corporation and Nevius Group NV are positive signals for the global chip sector. "Companies are placing very long-term AI infrastructure orders, indicating that they may fall far behind in meeting the computing power infrastructure needed for artificial intelligence," Kaufman said in an interview. "This means that the uptrend of semiconductors/chips looks very sustainable. Even though some stocks may be overbought and experience short-term pullbacks, chip giants like NVIDIA Corporation and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR will still be the biggest winners." Since 2025, chip stocks closely related to AI computing power infrastructure have been one of the most stable winners in the global market. According to data compiled by institutions, NVIDIA Corporation, Broadcom Inc., Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR, and Micron Technology, Inc. have contributed to the chip index - the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, by over 65% this year. Undoubtedly, the recent announcement by global cloud computing giant Oracle Corporation of a contract backlog far exceeding market expectations of $455 billion, and the strong performance and future outlook announced by the global AI ASIC chip "superpower" Broadcom Inc. last week, have significantly strengthened the "long-term bull market narrative" in the AI GPU, ASIC, and HBM sectors. The demand brought by generative AI applications and AI intelligent systems dominated by inference endpoints is expected to drive continuous exponential growth in the AI computing power infrastructure market. According to Huang Renxun, the AI inference system is expected to become the largest revenue source for NVIDIA Corporation in the future. The global surge in demand for AI computing power, combined with the ever-expanding AI infrastructure investment projects led by the US government and the continuous hefty investments by global tech giants in building large data centers, largely signifies that the sweeping "AI belief" worldwide is far from over in terms of stock price "super catalysis" for the leaders in AI computing power, investors who are fond of NVIDIA Corporation and the AI computing industry chain are betting that NVIDIA Corporation, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR, and Broadcom Inc. will continue to play out the "bull market curve", thus driving global stock markets to continue experiencing a bull market trend. Latest outlook for the semiconductor industry: AI-driven growth remains incredibly strong Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. stated that the overall sentiment for semiconductor companies focused on AI computing power infrastructure is very optimistic, with AI-related revenue expected to continue to significantly increase in the next two years. Enterprise AI workloads will be increasingly shouldered by more "commercial solutions" in the future. Non-AI-related areas still have room for inventory and soft demand digestion, which may impact short-term fluctuations in the semiconductor sector, according to Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. For example, at the Communacopia + Technology conference, Broadcom Inc. CEO Tan Fuyang projected that the company's revenue closely related to AI is expected to exceed the sum of software and non-AI business revenue in the next two years. Additionally, the Broadcom Inc. management has set a target of reaching AI revenue of up to $120 billion by the 2030 fiscal year, directly tied to CEO compensation. According to Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.'s report, this latest outlook number, five times higher than the institution's forecast for Broadcom Inc.'s AI revenue of $20 billion by the 2025 fiscal year, highlights the management's extreme confidence in revenue generation from AI ASIC chips. During the same conference, Applied Materials President and CEO Gary Dickerson stated that HBM and advanced packaging manufacturing equipment will be strong growth vectors in the medium to long term, while new chip manufacturing node equipment such as GAA (Gate-All-Around) and BPD (Backside Power Delivery) will be the core drivers of the company's next round of strong growth. Especially in the advanced packaging manufacturing equipment sector, Dickerson said that the doubling of revenue in this business line is still on track, with significant incremental growth imminent, continuing expansion in market share in the HBM equipment domain, increasingly related to DRAM etching innovation. In the eyes of Wall Street investment giants Loop Capital and Wedbush, the global wave of investments in AI computing hardware as the core of the global AI infrastructure is far from over, just at the beginning. Under the unprecedented "AI computing power demand storm", this round of AI investment boom could reach as high as $2 trillion. NVIDIA Corporation CEO Huang Renxun even predicts that by 2030, spending on AI infrastructure will reach $3 trillion to $4 trillion, and its scale and scope will bring significant long-term growth opportunities to NVIDIA Corporation. It is under the epic rise in stock prices of leaders in the AI computing industry chain such as NVIDIA Corporation, Alphabet Inc. Class C, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Sponsored ADR, and Broadcom Inc., as well as the continued strong performance in this year, that an unprecedented wave of AI investments has swept through the US stock market and global stock markets, driving global benchmark indices - such as the MSCI Global Index, to soar since April, continuously hitting historical highs. The latest data from the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization (WSTS) on the semiconductor industry outlook suggests that global chip demand recovery is expected to continue from 2025 to 2026. Analog chips, which have experienced sustained soft demand since the end of 2022, are expected to soon enter a strong recovery trend. WSTS predicts that after a strong rebound in 2024, the global semiconductor market will grow by 11.2% in 2025, reaching a total value of $700.9 billion. This growth is mainly driven by the logic chip sector dominated by GPUs and the storage sector dominated by HBM, with both sectors expected to achieve strong double-digit growth, benefiting from the continuous strong demand in areas such as AI inference systems, cloud computing infrastructure, and cutting-edge consumer electronics. WSTS forecasts that the global semiconductor market will continue to grow by 8.5% to reach $760.7 billion by 2026, building on the strong recovery in 2025. Storage chips are expected to lead the growth again, with logic and analog chips also making significant contributions. Analog chips are expected to move towards a robust recovery cycle.