Global chipmakers feel the pinch of Trump’s shifting trade policy

Global chipmakers feel the pinch of Trump’s shifting trade policy
An NVIDIA logo is displayed on a building in Taipei, Taiwan, on April 16, 2025. (REUTERS)
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Updated 17 April 2025
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Global chipmakers feel the pinch of Trump’s shifting trade policy

Global chipmakers feel the pinch of Trump’s shifting trade policy
  • Nvidia has warned of a $5.5 billion hit after Washington restricted exports of its AI processor tailored for China
  • Tightening US export curbs have in recent years made it harder for American chipmakers to tap the Chinese market

 

Global chip stocks were battered on Wednesday on fresh evidence of how US President Donald Trump’s shifting trade policy was complicating the outlook for semiconductor and computing giants, including AI pioneer Nvidia and its rival AMD.
Attempts to reorient global trade through tariffs and export curbs have started to show the effect as Nvidia warned of a $5.5 billion hit after Washington restricted exports of its AI processor tailored for China, while Dutch chip-making tools giant ASML raised doubts about its outlook.
The US restriction, which also hit the MI308 processor of Advanced Micro Devices, marked the latest blow for the AI chip trade that is losing steam after a two-year rally as tariff threats and fears over Big Tech’s spending weigh on sentiment.
Nvidia shares closed down nearly 7 percent on Wednesday, with the company losing more than $148 billion in market value. AMD fell 5.8 percent as it warned of a $800 million hit from the latest curb, while AI-related chip stocks including Arm, Broadcom and Micron dropped between 2.5 percent and 4.6 percent.
Nvidia said on Wednesday that it follows the US government’s directions on where it can sell its chips after the US Commerce Department announced on Tuesday it was issuing new export licensing requirements for Nvidia’s H20 chips.
“The US government instructs American businesses on what they can sell and where — we follow the government’s directions to the letter,” Nvidia said.
“The technology industry supports America when it exports to well-known companies worldwide — if the government felt otherwise, it would instruct us,” the company added.




Global stock markets mostly retreated Wednesday after the US government imposed restrictions on exports of a key Nvidia chip to China, the latest trade war salvo between the world's biggest economies. (AFP)

Tightening US export curbs have in recent years made it harder for American chipmakers to tap the Chinese market, but the country remains a key source of revenue.
“The US export restrictions on Nvidia’s H20 chips highlight the growing geopolitical uncertainty enveloping the tech and semiconductor sectors, particularly under Trump-era-style policy reversals,” said Michael Ashley Schulman, chief investment officer at Running Point Capital.
“This unpredictability rattles businesses and investment markets, as evidenced by Nvidia’s selloff this morning and broader pressure across chip stocks.”
Nvidia drew over 13 percent of its sales, or about $17 billion, from China in its last financial year, although that was down from 21 percent in fiscal 2023. For AMD, China was its second-largest market last year, accounting for more than 24 percent of total sales.
“The H20 portion was about $12 billion or so (of the total China revenue), roughly about 30 cents of earnings per share, not trivial but not enormous in the grand scheme of things,” Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon said.
“H20 performance is low, well below already-available Chinese alternatives; a ban essentially simply hands the Chinese AI market over to Huawei.”
Rasgon said the move may have surprised many investors as shares had surged nearly 18 percent last week, partly due to a report that the Trump administration planned to back off from such a curb after CEO Jensen Huang attended a Mar-a-Lago dinner.
The company had earlier this week unveiled plans to build AI servers worth as much as $500 billion in the US over the next four years, a move largely seen as an overture to Trump.
Trump has for now exempted semiconductors and some other electronics from his tariffs, but he has warned that sector-specific levies will be announced in the coming weeks.
Such tariffs could cost US semiconductor equipment makers more than $1 billion a year, Reuters reported on Tuesday.

NVIDIA fallout
News of the latest export curb on Nvidia sparked a selloff in chip companies and its suppliers across the globe.
In South Korea, Samsung closed down about 3 percent, while SK Hynix closed 4 percent lower.
European chipmakers ASM International and Infineon Technologies fell more than 2 percent, while Japanese chip-testing equipment maker Advantest — an Nvidia supplier — was the Nikkei’s second-worst performer with a 5 percent tumble.

Still, some analysts said Nvidia’s overall sales have continued to surge even as the China contribution slows while chip demand remains strong from big cloud companies.
“While we acknowledge the likely impact to near-term numbers, we would stress that Blackwell shipments to core hyperscale customers remains the driver of fundamentals,” TD Cowen analysts said, referring to Nvidia’s latest line of AI systems.
 


US may soon deport migrants to Libya on military flight, sources say

Updated 3 sec ago
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US may soon deport migrants to Libya on military flight, sources say

US may soon deport migrants to Libya on military flight, sources say
Two of the officials said the US military could fly the migrants to the North African country as soon as Wednesday
Reuters could not determine how many migrants would be sent to Libya

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump’s administration may deport migrants to Libya for the first time this week, three US officials said on Tuesday, as part of his immigration crackdown and despite Washington’s past condemnation of Libya’s harsh treatment of detainees.
Two of the officials said the US military could fly the migrants to the North African country as soon as Wednesday, but stressed that plans could change.
The Pentagon referred queries to the White House. The White House and Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A State Department spokesperson said: “We do not discuss the details of our diplomatic communications with other governments.”
Reuters could not determine how many migrants would be sent to Libya or the nationalities of the individuals that the administration is eyeing for deportation. Libya’s Government of National Unity said on Wednesday it rejected the use of Libyan territory as a destination for deporting migrants without its knowledge or consent. It also said there was no coordination with the United States regarding the reception of migrants.
Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army, which controls eastern Libya, also rejected in a statement the idea of the country taking migrants deported from the United States, saying it “violates the sovereignty of the homeland.”
Trump, who made immigration a major issue during his election campaign, has launched aggressive enforcement action since taking office, surging troops to the southern border and pledging to deport millions of immigrants in the United States illegally.
As of Monday, the Trump administration has deported 152,000 people, according to DHS.
The administration has tried to encourage migrants to leave voluntarily by threatening steep fines, trying to strip away legal status, and deporting migrants to notorious prisons in Guantanamo Bay and El Salvador.
LIFE-THREATENING
In its annual human rights report released last year, the US State Department criticized Libya’s “harsh and life-threatening prison conditions” and “arbitrary arrest or detention.”
In its travel advisory, the Department advises US citizens against visiting the country due to “crime, civil unrest, kidnapping and armed conflict.”
Libya’s west is overseen by the GNU under Prime Minister Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah, who was installed in Tripoli through a UN-backed process in 2021. Eastern Libya has a parallel administration and is controlled by commander Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army.
Major fighting ended with a truce in 2020 but the underlying political dispute between the sides remains and there are sporadic clashes between rival factions.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week said the United States was not satisfied only with sending migrants to El Salvador, and hinted that Washington was looking to expand the number of countries that it may deport people to.
“We are working with other countries to say: We want to send you some of the most despicable human beings, will you do this as a favor to us,” Rubio said at a cabinet meeting at the White House last Wednesday.
“And the further away from America, the better.”
A fourth US official said the administration has for several weeks been looking at a number of countries to send migrants to, including Libya.
It wasn’t immediately clear if the administration had struck an agreement with the Libyan authorities to accept deportees of other nationalities. On April 19 the Supreme Court justices temporarily barred the Trump administration from deporting a group of Venezuelan migrants it accused of being gang members. Trump’s administration, which has invoked a rarely used wartime law, has urged the justices to lift or narrow their order.
It is unclear what kind of due process might be underway ahead of any Libya deportations.
Libya has had little peace since a 2011 NATO-backed uprising, and it split in 2014 between eastern and western factions, with rival administrations governing in each area.
A Tripoli-based Government of National Unity under Prime Minister Abdulhamid Al-Dbeibah was installed through a UN-backed process in 2021 but the Benghazi-based House of Representatives no longer recognizes its legitimacy.

Kabul warns India, Pakistan that escalation ‘not in interest of region’

Kabul warns India, Pakistan that escalation ‘not in interest of region’
Updated 17 min 35 sec ago
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Kabul warns India, Pakistan that escalation ‘not in interest of region’

Kabul warns India, Pakistan that escalation ‘not in interest of region’
  • The Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged both sides to exercise restraint
  • Relations between the Taliban government and neighboring Pakistan have been strained

KABUL: Afghanistan’s Taliban government warned India and Pakistan on Wednesday that further escalation was not “in the interest of the region” after they exchanged artillery fire along their contested frontier.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on the social media platform X that “it urges both sides to exercise restraint and resolve their issues through dialogue and diplomacy.”


Islamabad said 26 civilians were killed by the Indian strikes or gunfire along the border, while New Delhi reported at least 12 dead from Pakistani shelling.
Relations between the Taliban government and neighboring Pakistan have been strained over security concerns and Islamabad’s deportation campaign which has expelled tens of thousands of Afghans since the beginning of April.
The Taliban, who returned to power in Kabul in the summer of 2021, have in contrast developed closer ties with New Delhi, even though it does not recognize their government.
The violence between India and Pakistan was sparked after New Delhi accused Pakistan of backing the deadliest attack in years on civilians in Indian-administered Kashmir on April 22, which killed 26 men. Islamabad rejects the charge.


India urges restraint but remains ‘fully prepared’ amid tensions with Pakistan, army says

India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri holds a press briefing with Indian army officials following India’s military strikes.
India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri holds a press briefing with Indian army officials following India’s military strikes.
Updated 54 min 1 sec ago
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India urges restraint but remains ‘fully prepared’ amid tensions with Pakistan, army says

India’s Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri holds a press briefing with Indian army officials following India’s military strikes.
  • Indian strikes were ‘measured, non-escalatory, responsible’ foreign secretary says
  • Pakistani officials say at least 26 civilians were killed in Indian missile strikes

NEW DELHI: Indian forces are fully prepared to respond to any retaliation from Pakistan, an army spokeswoman said on Wednesday, after Delhi launched missile strikes on Pakistani sites that it said were linked to last month’s deadly attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir.

Indian Armed Forces launched “Operation Sindoor” in the early hours of Wednesday, hitting nine locations in Pakistan’s densely populated Punjab province and Pakistan-administered Kashmir, from where it said “terrorist attacks against India have been planned and directed.”

The strikes came amid heightened tensions between the rivaling neighbors in the aftermath of an attack on tourists near the resort town of Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir on April 22, in which 26 people — 25 Indians and one Nepali citizen — were killed.

“India has demonstrated considerable restraint in its response. However, it must be said that the Indian armed forces are fully prepared to respond to Pakistani misadventures, if any, that will escalate the situation,” Wing Commander Vyomika Singh told a joint briefing by the Indian military and Ministry of External Affairs in the Indian capital.

“Operation Sindoor was launched by Indian Armed Forces to deliver justice to the victims of Pahalgam terror attack and their families.”

She said that Indian forces used niche technology weapons and carefully chose warheads to avoid collateral damage to civilians and civilian infrastructure, without providing more detail.

Sindoor, which refers to the vermilion powder worn by married Hindu women, is an apparent reference to the widows left by the April 22 attack, in which the victims were all men.

Indian officials showed footage of what they said were strikes on the targets in Pakistan during the Delhi briefing, as well as a map marking locations of what they said were “terror infrastructure.”

“Over the last three decades, Pakistan has systematically built terror infrastructure. It is a complex web of recruitment and indoctrination centers, training areas for initial and refresh of courses and launch pads for handlers. These camps are located both in Pakistan as well as Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir areas,” Singh said.

Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said India’s actions were “measured, non-escalatory, proportionate and responsible.”

“They focused on dismantling the terrorist infrastructure and disabling terrorists likely to be sent across to India.”

He said the strikes were launched because there was “no demonstrable step” from Pakistan to “take action against the terrorist infrastructure on its territory or on territory under its control” since the Pahalgam attack.

“Instead, all it has indulged in are denials and allegations. Our intelligence monitoring of Pakistan-based terrorist modules indicated that further attacks against India were impending,” he said.

Kashmir has been the subject of international dispute since the 1947 partition of the Indian subcontinent into Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan.

Both countries claim the Himalayan region in full and rule in part, and have fought two of their three wars over it.

Indian-administered Kashmir has for decades witnessed outbreaks of separatist insurgency to resist control from the government in Delhi, which accuses Pakistan of arming and training militants since 1989. Islamabad has denied those allegations, saying it offers only moral and diplomatic support to the Kashmiri people in their struggle for self-determination.

A Pakistan military spokesperson said at least 26 civilians were killed in the Indian strikes on Wednesday.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said on Wednesday the country’s top national security body had authorized its armed forces to take “corresponding actions” in response to the Indian strikes.

India and Pakistan have had near daily exchanges of fire across the de facto border, called the Line of Control, which divides disputed Kashmir between them.

On Wednesday morning, they also exchanged intense shelling and heavy gunfire across much of the frontier, which reportedly killed and injured dozens of civilians on both sides.


EU takes Hungary to top court in migrant smuggler case

EU takes Hungary to top court in migrant smuggler case
Updated 07 May 2025
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EU takes Hungary to top court in migrant smuggler case

EU takes Hungary to top court in migrant smuggler case
  • The EU charged that no system was put in place to ensure smugglers were taken back into custody once expelled
  • Brussels accuses Budapest of a failure to meet its obligations

BRUSSELS: The European Commission on Wednesday said it will take Hungary to the EU’s top court for breaching rules on combatting people-trafficking, in the latest showdown between Brussels and the nationalist government in Budapest.
Brussels launched legal action in 2023 after Budapest decided to release and expel several thousand jailed migrant traffickers on the grounds holding them in Hungarian prisons was a burden to the taxpayer.
An April 2023 decree by Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government enabled the smugglers’ release — giving them three days to leave Hungary, theoretically with a view to serving out their sentences in their home country.
But the EU charged that no system was put in place to ensure smugglers were taken back into custody once expelled, and decided to refer Hungary to the European Court of Justice after it failed to address the concerns.
More than 2,400 people-smugglers had been released under the measure as of January this year, according to Hungarian government figures.
Brussels accuses Budapest of a failure to meet its obligations to “impose effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions” for migrant smuggling.
Hungary’s government has retorted that human traffickers can only operate because of European laws encouraging migration.
Brussels has repeatedly locked horns with Orban’s government over its tough line on migration — one of a long list of areas where the EU deems Budapest to be falling short of its democratic standards.
In June last year, the EU’s top court fined Hungary 200 million euros ($216 million) and imposed a daily one-million-euro penalty for illegally deporting migrants.
More broadly, billions of euros in EU funds are currently frozen over issues including the treatment of asylum seekers, LGBTQ rights, alleged corruption and the independence of academics.


Senior Tories urge Palestinian recognition in letter to UK PM

An Israeli army bulldozer demolishes homes next to a mosque in the Palestinian urban refugee camp of Nur Shams, in the West Bank
An Israeli army bulldozer demolishes homes next to a mosque in the Palestinian urban refugee camp of Nur Shams, in the West Bank
Updated 07 May 2025
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Senior Tories urge Palestinian recognition in letter to UK PM

An Israeli army bulldozer demolishes homes next to a mosque in the Palestinian urban refugee camp of Nur Shams, in the West Bank
  • Group of 7 MPs, 6 Lords peers break ranks with party over ‘opportunity for Britain to show leadership’
  • It comes ahead of critical Saudi-French conference on 2-state solution next month

LONDON: A group of senior Conservative MPs and peers in the UK have broken ranks with their own party and called on the government to immediately recognize Palestine as a state.

In a letter to Prime Minister Keir Starmer drafted in late March, seven MPs and six House of Lords peers urged the government to give formal recognition to Palestine, The Guardian reported.

It comes ahead of critical UN talks on the issue next month.

The letter, seen by The Guardian, was authored just after Israel broke its tenuous peace agreement with Hamas in March.

The breakdown in negotiations and peace efforts worsened this week after the Israeli cabinet approved plans to “conquer” and occupy almost all of the Gaza Strip.

Former government minister Kit Malthouse, from the moderate wing of the opposition Conservative Party, organized the letter.

It said: “For decades, the Palestinian people have endured occupation, displacement and systemic restrictions on their basic freedoms.

“Recognising Palestine would affirm our nation’s commitment to upholding the principles of justice, self-determination and equal rights. It would send a clear message that Britain stands against indefinite occupation and supports the Palestinian people’s legitimate aspirations.”

The letter was also signed by Conservatives associated with the right of the party, including John Hayes and Desmond Swayne.

Most countries with UN membership formally recognize Palestine as a state, but the US and the majority of European countries do not.

Saudi Arabia and France next month will host a conference to rally support for a two-state solution to the conflict.

French President Emmanuel Macron has suggested that France could grant formal recognition to Palestine at the conference.

David Lammy, the British foreign secretary, said last week that the government was discussing its plans with France for the event in June.

Starmer is understood to not have replied to the Conservative letter.

Last year, David Cameron, the former prime minister, said that he wanted Palestinian recognition as part of peace negotiations with Israel, and not as a reward for the reaching of a two-state solution.

The letter sent to Starmer added: “Recognition should not be treated as a distant bargaining chip but as a necessary step to reinforce international law and diplomacy. Prime minister, we stand ready to offer our public support for this decision.

“This is an opportunity for Britain to show leadership, to be on the right side of history and to uphold the principles we claim to champion. More than 140 UN member states have already recognised Palestine — it is time for the United Kingdom to do the same.”

A government spokesperson told The Guardian that the UK remains committed to a two-state solution, highlighting recent talks between Starmer and Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa.