quinta-feira, 18 de junho de 2026

Semis bounce as AI capex cycle holds; INTC starts 18A-P production, SPCX takes a breather

Semis reclaimed ground after Tuesday's positioning/sentiment selloff, with the speed of recovery suggesting dips remain biddable and the AI capex cycle has not flinched. INTC (+3.46%) announced the start of production on its most advanced 18A-P node, while SPCX (-4.94%) had its first down day since IPO on renewed NY Times Tesla merger speculation. Russell index inclusion on June 26th remains a structural tailwind with an unchanged $2.68B passive inflow estimate.

US holds off blacklisting DeepSeek, CXMT and 100+ Chinese firms

Reuters reports the US has held off adding Chinese companies such as DeepSeek (private), CXMT (private) and 100+ other entities to the Commerce Department's Entity List, reportedly to avoid escalating tensions with Beijing. The companies were flagged by an interagency committee last year but no Entity List additions have been published since last October. Separately, the Pentagon last week added several Chinese companies to its CMC list, though that list has no real near-term implications.

Samsung Foundry sees surge in capacity requests from BYD, GOOGL, AMD, TSLA

Nikkei reports Samsung Foundry is seeing rising requests from existing and potential customers including BYD (1211 HK), GOOGL, AMD and TSLA for advanced chip capacity. GOOGL is engaging on next-gen Axion CPUs for a 2028E launch and considering Samsung for part of its TPUs, AMD is working on future CPUs from 2028E, and TSLA will use Samsung exclusively for AI6. Jefferies notes Samsung guided foundry to breakeven this year and a return to profitability next year; AMD as a potential CPU customer is relatively new.

Optical names sell off on CPO delay concerns; Dongshan Precision expands capacity

Optical sold off overnight as more investors in Asia and the US lean short, especially after talk of CPO delays now spreading from scale-up to NVDA's scale-out CPO rollout. Jefferies flags longer-term China risk: Dongshan Precision (002384 CH) announced a new $1.2bn investment to expand optical chip and module capacity via subsidiary Source Photonics in Taiwan, and is talking up EML/CW laser capabilities and developing in-house SiPh transceivers already in customer talks.

IFX selloff debated; possible rotation from Analog into US WFE

Jefferies fielded heavy incoming on why IFX sold off hard in the PM, with the move on the US open arguing against the earlier BMW warning and pointing instead to a competitor note bullish on US WFE — suggesting rotation from Analog into WFE. US analog names ON, MCHP and TXN saw similar moves lower on the open, and the action looked positioning-driven. IFX rebounded +5% today, possibly as investors get comfortable the 800V delay narrative isn't necessarily negative for the stock.

📄 Publicações e eventos

Asia Supply Chain — Management Meetings Key Takeaways (Conor O'Mara, Tues 23 June, 8am ET)

Call covering key takeaways, new feedback and conclusions from management meetings across Korea, Taiwan and Japan, spanning Memory (Samsung, Kioxia, SimmTech), Foundry (Samsung), Substrates, CCL, Wafers (SUMCO), Batteries/DC Power, Liquid Cooling, ASIC Design (GUC), Semis Materials and Semicap. Discussion themes include Agentic AI, Memory, GPUs & ASICs, AI supply chain, Foundry and Semicap equipment. Speakers: Sherman Shang and Conor O'Mara; host William Beavington.

Updated Slide Decks: Taiwan Upstream 2026 Outlook, US SEMIS H2'25 Top Picks, EU SEMIS

Three refreshed decks available: New Taiwan Upstream 2026 Outlook (78 pages) covering possible foundry supply shortage in 2027, TSMC capex outlook, advanced packaging capex, GPU/ASIC production, chip testing and Taiwan top picks; US SEMIS H2'25 Top Picks (5 pages); and EU SEMIS deck (74 pages). All updated last week.

Updated Models: AI Model, WFE Model, Optical Model

Refreshed models available, all updated last week: an AI Model (incl. CPU build, HBM model, power model, accelerator info, chip performance, rack comparison, CoWoS forecast, GPU and ASIC status sheets), a WFE Model, and an Optical Model.

US restrictions on Anthropic Fable 5 access seen as likely unsustainable

Jefferies argues US restrictions on Anthropic Fable 5 access could hurt the US AI ecosystem given many US AI researchers and engineers are foreign-born. Anti-distillation features from US vendors and compute shortages remain risks to Chinese LLMs, but China is catching up — GLM 5.2's global #3 ranking marks the first time a China vendor has reached the Top 3.

China AI: US-China model gap widens as Anthropic Fable/Mythos 5 tops intelligence rankings

Anthropic's Fable/Mythos 5 now ranks No.1 in global model intelligence, widening the US-China gap from 8% to 13%, with anti-distillation features and US export controls making it harder for China's open-source models to catch up. China AI faces compute shortage for inference and price competition that depresses API pricing while hardware (memory) costs soar; Anthropic doubled Fable 5 API pricing vs Opus 4.8 and average US API pricing rose 89% Mar-Jun. Chinese API pricing has stayed flat, falling 2% MoM in June driven by a 33% MiniMax price cut — Edison flags price competition among China AI labs as the biggest concern.

📄 Publicações e eventos

Global A.I. — Could It All Be Built on Broken Economics? (Aniket Shah w/ Ed Zitron, Tues 30 June, 11am ET)

Washington Strategy call with guest Ed Zitron (CEO of EZPR, host of Better Offline) examining his critique of generative AI's unit economics, the gap between hype and durable demand, and what investors may be underestimating as costs, returns and expectations collide. Hosted by Aniket Shah, Global Head of Washington, Sustainability & Transition Strategy. June 30, 11:00-11:30 AM ET / 4pm UK.

Equities close sharply lower on hawkish FOMC under Warsh; strong May retail sales

Equities closed sharply lower as traders digested a hawkish FOMC at Warsh's inaugural meeting — only four paragraphs, forward guidance removed, and 50% of officials backing at least one cut in 2026. The bond market led equities lower, with the 2YY pushing as high as 4.21% and money markets fully pricing an October hike, despite some recovery during the presser. The Iran MOU (signing possibly imminent) offered little cushion, while strong May retail sales (+0.9% m/m, broad-based) provided a resilient macro backdrop; Industrials, Financials and Tech led while CommServs, ConsDisc and REITs lagged.

O dia foi dominado pela intersecção entre Apple, semicondutores e geopolítica da IA. O destaque comercial veio do anúncio, atribuído ao presidente Donald Trump, de que a Apple passará a fabricar chips nos EUA em parceria com a Intel — notícia ecoada por Jukan, Dan Nystedt e MacRumors, ao lado de menções a Nvidia e à TeraFab de Elon Musk também ligadas à Intel. Em paralelo, Tim Cook confirmou aumentos de preço nos produtos da Apple devido à escalada nos custos de memória RAM, tema reforçado por MacRumors e 9to5Mac.

No campo da inteligência artificial, a tensão entre Washington e a Anthropic ganhou força: relatos sobre o almoço de CEOs de IA com Trump (onde Sam Altman e Demis Hassabis ficaram ao lado do presidente enquanto Dario Amodei foi posicionado à margem), declarações de David Sacks criticando a postura da Anthropic e reportagens do NYT/WIRED sobre o futuro do modelo Fable 5 e exigências de guardrails inquebráveis. Também surgiram pedidos de Amodei e Hassabis por uma coalizão liderada pelos EUA para definir padrões de IA, excluindo a China — sinalizando uma nova 'Guerra Fria' tecnológica.

No ecossistema Apple propriamente dito, a temporada de betas trouxe forte cobertura do iOS 27, com novas animações coloridas da Siri, recursos no app Notas, melhorias no Apple One, no Apple Weather e dezenas de otimizações de desempenho, além de novidades em watchOS 27, iPadOS 27 e macOS 27. Rumores de hardware incluíram o iPhone Air com câmera de lente dupla previsto para 2027. Completaram o noticiário avanços em semicondutores (substrato de núcleo de vidro da TSMC detalhado por Ming-Chi Kuo), movimentos de mercado coreano (Samsung, SK Hynix, KOSPI) e marcos de IA como a contratação de Noam Shazeer pela OpenAI e o anúncio do Seedance 2.5.