Key Notes
- The Nikkei and Kospi closed about 6% lower on November 6, while Taiwan fell 4.5% and Shanghai lost 1.1%.
- A drop of more than 8% briefly halted Seoul trading, before the Kospi recovered to close above 5,000.
- SK hynix and SoftBank lost more than 10% as investors reassessed AI infrastructure spending after the US chip rout.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 and South Korea’s Kospi closed about 6% lower Friday as the selloff in artificial-intelligence stocks spread across Asia, hammering the chipmakers that supply the industry’s data centers. Taiwan’s benchmark lost 4.5%, while Shanghai’s decline was smaller at 1.1%.
The falls followed a 12.2% plunge in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index on Thursday. Investors are reassessing how quickly AI infrastructure can expand as financing concerns collide with the prospect of tighter U.S. oversight after Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress.
Seoul’s market briefly stopped trading after the Kospi dropped more than 8% in the opening minutes. Buyers pulled the index back above 5,000, but the recovery left it nursing an almost 11% loss over two sessions.
Tokyo and Seoul Lead the Regional Decline
The November 6 closing figures show the scale of the retreat:
- Nikkei 225: down 5.96% to 57,434.77, a loss of 3,643.13 points.
- Kospi: down 6.02% to 5,059.69, a loss of 324.11 points.
- Taiwan Weighted Index: down 4.51% to 39,701.64.
- Shanghai Composite: down 1.10% to 3,649.18.
The Kospi touched 4,911.28 during the session, about 8.8% below Thursday’s close, according to historical prices. That took the benchmark below 5,000 for the first time in nine months. A circuit breaker suspended trading for 20 minutes before dealings resumed, RTHK reported.
Japan’s benchmark also finished above its worst level. The Nikkei fell as low as 56,745.81 before recovering some ground. Taiwan’s index closed well above its session low of 37,837.05, which had represented a decline of roughly 9%.
Foreign investors sold about 2.8 trillion won of South Korean shares, according to Yonhap’s closing report. Selling reached beyond technology, although the country’s largest memory-chip producers were among the hardest hit.
Chip Stocks Suffer Another Heavy Session
Several of the largest AI suppliers recovered from steeper intraday losses but still finished sharply lower. These are Friday’s closing moves for their local primary listings, calculated from daily prices:
- Kioxia Holdings (TSE: 285A): down 8.72% to ¥8,511.
- SK hynix (KRX: 000660): down 10.44% to 1,132,000 won.
- SoftBank Group (TSE: 9984): down 10.83% to ¥3,549.
- Samsung Electronics (KRX: 005930): down 6.35% to 188,700 won.
- TSMC (TWSE: 2330): down 4.69% to NT$2,135.
The closing prices differ markedly from the worst readings of the day. Kioxia had fallen about 15.3%, SoftBank 15.8% and TSMC 9.8% at their session lows. The late recovery reduced the damage without reversing the direction of the selloff.
Friday compounded Thursday’s memory-stock decline. Across the two sessions, Kioxia lost about 20.7% and SK hynix 18.9%, based on their Wednesday and Friday closes. Samsung fell 13.4% over the same period.
U.S. Policy Fears Reach Asian Suppliers
The immediate backdrop was Thursday’s Wall Street rout, when the Nasdaq Composite fell 5.52% and the S&P 500 lost 4.36%. The technology-heavy Nasdaq 100 dropped 6.36%.
Charles Schwab’s market analysis put the semiconductor index’s decline at 12.2%, leaving it roughly 32% below its recent peak. The brokerage cited both fears about tighter data-center regulation and longer-running questions over the funding and returns from AI investment.
For Asian suppliers, the transmission is direct. Data-center projects require memory, processors, storage and chipmaking equipment. Delays to construction can push purchases into later quarters, changing the revenue outlook even when the underlying demand for computing keeps growing.
Investors are pricing that risk before the new Congress takes office. The election result does not itself cancel a customer order or impose a nationwide construction ban. Daishin Securities analyst Lee Kyoung-min told Yonhap that the possibility of a complete suspension of U.S. data-center expansion was low, describing the market reaction as excessive.
Record Profits Fail to Stop the Selling
The retreat comes shortly after strong quarterly results from the Korean memory leaders. SK hynix reported record operating profit last week as premium server-memory sales and HBM4 shipments expanded. Samsung disclosed a 783% increase in operating profit, with semiconductors supplying almost all of the group’s operating earnings.
The selloff has swiftly cut the valuations attached to that growth. Samsung ended Friday at 188,700 won after trading as high as 228,000 won earlier in the week. SK hynix closed at 1,132,000 won after touching 1,476,000 won on Wednesday.
Both producers are still expanding supply to serve AI customers. SK hynix’s October outlook called for its M15X facility to reach maximum capacity by year-end as the company ramps up HBM4 production.
