Nvidia’s half-a-trillion dollar wipeout leaves global chip stocks volatile

Global semiconductor stocks saw volatile trading Tuesday after a slump in shares of Nvidia during the previous session.

Shares of chip firms in Europe and Asia fell in early trade as investors reacted to Nvidia losing more than $500 billion in market capitalization over three trading days. Some of the stocks recouped losses, however, as shares in the U.S. chipmaking giant rose around 5.5% as of Tuesday 11:40 a.m. ET.

Switzerland-based semiconductor firm STMicroelectronics‘ shares ended the day down more than 1.4%.

In Europe, ASML, the Dutch chip equipment giant, reversed losses earlier in the day to close up 0.18% as Nvidia shares recovered. ASML is a key player in the global semiconductor market. The firm makes and sells extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines, which chipmakers use to manufacture integrated circuits.

Soitec, meanwhile, slipped 0.1%, while ASMI climbed 0.6% after falling earlier in the session. The pan-European Stoxx 600 closed around 0.3% lower.

Asian semiconductor shares also had a volatile day. Taiwanese chip firm MediaTek’s shares fell 1.8%, while South Korean firm Samsung slipped 0.3%.

TSMC, the world’s largest chipmaker, and SK Hynix managed to dodge the negative sentiment, rising 0.5% and 0.9%, respectively.

It comes after a sharp slide in shares of Nvidia over three consecutive sessions, falling 13% from Thursday’s all-time highs.

On Monday, Nvidia closed down 6.7% — its second-steepest drop of the year — but the shares started to rebound in early trade Tuesday.

The company last week topped Apple and Microsoft as the most valuable U.S. company, reaching a market capitalization over $3.4 trillion. By the end of Monday, Nvidia had seen more than $540 billion erased from its market value after hitting an intraday record on Thursday.

For its part, Nvidia says that demand for its prized artificial intelligence graphics processing units, or GPUs, remains high.

Companies including Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Oracle and Meta are buying billions of dollars worth of its chips to power their data centers and cloud services.

Later this year, Nvidia will start shipping its next-generation AI chips, called Blackwell, which some analysts say could kick off another cycle of significant growth for the chipmaker and its partners.

— CNBC’s Kif Leswing contributed to this report.