Japan’s Renesas and South Korea’s SK Hynix led a sharp “summer storm” drop in Asian stock markets on Thursday, deepening a global slump in tech shares and following the heaviest one-day drop in the Nasdaq since 2022. During Tokyo’s morning session, the broad Topix index of Japanese stocks, which had rallied to an all-time high this month, fell more than 2.5 per cent, wiping out its gains for July and settling at a five-week low.
Investors focused more on the fact that its more advanced HBM3E chips were yet to pass the US company’s qualification tests. “There are concerns about valuations of AI-related stocks in general,” said Kwak Min-jung, an analyst at Hyundai Motor Securities. “SK Hynix’s stock price could be further dented by Samsung’s supply of advanced HBM chips to Nvidia, but it is likely to take more time for Samsung’s HBM3E chips to meet Nvidia’s standards.