SoftBank led the losses, sinking more than 10% in Tokyo. The tech conglomerate has recently sold its Nvidia stake but remains heavily exposed to the sector through its majority ownership of Arm, whose chip architecture underpins many Nvidia designs. SoftBank is also involved in large-scale AI infrastructure projects—including the $500 billion Stargate data-center initiative in the U.S.—that depend on Nvidia hardware.
South Korean memory giants were also hit hard. SK Hynix, Nvidia’s top supplier of high-bandwidth memory for AI systems, slid nearly 10%, while rival Samsung Electronics fell more than 5%. In Taiwan, the world’s largest chip manufacturer, TSMC, dropped over 4%, and Hon Hai Precision Industry (Foxconn) lost 4.86% amid weaker sentiment.
The downturn followed Nvidia’s 3% fall in U.S. trading on Thursday, a move that surprised analysts given the company’s beat on third-quarter estimates and stronger-than-expected guidance for the fourth quarter—a forecast many believed would buoy sector earnings expectations.
Billy Toh, regional head of retail research at CGS International Securities Singapore, said Nvidia was caught in a “perfect storm” of external pressures, including a bitcoin decline, the possibility of a delayed Federal Reserve rate cut, and tighter financial conditions. Combined with ongoing concerns about a potential “AI bubble,” he said, the environment has created a broad risk-off shift with Nvidia at the center.
Smaller players across Asia were swept up as well. Renesas Electronics dropped 3%, Tokyo Electron fell 6.6%, and Lasertec declined 5.2%, reflecting how the market’s volatility spread well beyond the sector’s biggest names.