A surge in technology stocks boosted several key Asian equity markets on Friday, with the Taiwan Weighted Index jumping nearly 3% to lead regional gains. Investors cheered positive signs from semiconductor firms, including an upbeat annual forecast from chipmaking giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.
The Taiwanese benchmark closed up 2.63% at 17,681, driven largely by a nearly 7% rally in TSMC. South Korean memory chipmakers Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix also posted solid increases.
TSMC said Thursday it expects healthy growth this year thanks to strong demand for cutting-edge 3-nanometer and 5-nanometer chip technologies, particularly from artificial intelligence applications. The company’s positive guidance comes on the heels of a challenging 2022 amid global economic headwinds.
“TSMC is perfectly positioned to benefit from [AI],” said Daniel Newman, principal analyst at technology research firm Futurum. “There’s an insatiable appetite for low-power, high-performing chips that are going to be able to enable AI on devices.”
The optimism spread to other regional indexes. Japan’s Nikkei 225 rebounded 1.4% to 35,963 after two consecutive sessions of declines. South Korea’s Kospi added 1.34%, while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 rose 1.02% following three straight negative days.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, however, bucked the trend to slip 0.72% in a reversal of earlier gains. Chinese equities were also mostly lower, with the CSI 300 shedding 0.15% after rallying late on Thursday.
The mixed performance in Chinese markets came after Japan released crucial inflation data that marked the final major economic readout ahead of next week’s Bank of Japan policy meeting. The country’s headline consumer price index decelerated to 2.6% in December after peaking at 4% last spring, hitting the lowest level since June 2022.
While still above the central bank’s 2% target, cooling inflation could give the BOJ room to maintain its ultra-easy monetary policy, which has helped weaken the yen against major currencies. The Japanese unit did seesaw Friday following the CPI report.
U.S. Equities Rebound on Apple’s Surge
Overnight stateside, all three major Wall Street indexes scored gains after several down sessions over the past two weeks. The technology-focused Nasdaq Composite saw the biggest jump at 1.35% as Apple shares rocketed 3.3% on an analyst upgrade.
The iPhone maker scored its best single-day performance since early May after Bank of America turned bullish on the stock. Analyst Wamsi Mohan set a $200 price target, implying over 20% upside for Apple over the next year.
On the back of Apple’s surge, the S&P 500 finished up 0.88%, leaving it just shy of the record closing high it last reached in December. The blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.5%.
Amazon to Invest Heavily in Japanese Cloud Infrastructure
In company-specific news, Amazon announced plans to plow more than $15 billion into expanding its cloud computing infrastructure in Japan over the next five years. The tech giant aims to tap growing demand among Japanese public and private organizations looking to adopt emerging digital technologies like AI.
The 2.26 trillion yen investment will upgrade existing Amazon Web Services data centers in Tokyo and Osaka. Amazon has identified multiple Japanese industries that could benefit from greater access to advanced cloud services.
