HONG KONG (AP) — Stock markets across Asia mostly fell Thursday, driven by heavy selling in semiconductor shares, while U.S. futures showed little movement following a day of modest declines on Wall Street.
Oil prices dropped after negotiators from the United States and Iran held separate meetings with mediators from Qatar and Pakistan on Wednesday, as traders watched for signs of a lasting end to the war in Iran.
South Korea’s Kospi index took the steepest hit, plunging 5.1% to 7,877.45. Chip-related companies led the losses, with memory chip manufacturer SK Hynix dropping 7.7% and Samsung Electronics falling 6.4%.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 declined 1.5% to 69,443.16. Chip equipment manufacturer Tokyo Electron saw its shares drop 5.6%.
Taiwan’s Taiex slipped 1.1%, with chipmaking giant TSMC — formally known as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. — falling 1.8%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng bucked the trend, rising 0.8% to 23,060.63. Chinese electric vehicle company BYD saw its shares jump 8.7% after reporting a second consecutive month of rising sales. Meanwhile, the Shanghai Composite index dropped 0.9% to 4,075.58.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 edged down 0.1% to 8,710.30, while India’s Sensex gained 0.5%.
Markets across South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan had been riding high in recent months, fueled by surging interest in artificial intelligence. The Kospi and Nikkei 225 have climbed roughly 85% and 34%, respectively, so far this year. However, growing worries about a potential oversupply — given the enormous amounts being invested by major U.S. tech companies and others — have begun to weigh on investor confidence.
U.S. chip stocks also largely fell on Wednesday. Micron Technology dropped 10.6%, Intel fell 9%, AMD (Advanced Micro Devices) lost 6.9%, Broadcom slid 2.2%, and Nvidia declined 1.3%.
Wall Street’s S&P 500 finished Wednesday down 0.2% at 7,483.23. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped less than 0.1% to 52,305.24, and the tech-focused Nasdaq composite fell 0.7% to 26,040.03.
Economists Megan Fisher and Vicky Redwood at Capital Economics offered a cautious outlook in a note published Thursday. “AI demand may continue to grow but at a slower pace than expected,” they wrote. “Firms and investors may be underestimating the barriers to AI adoption.”
The economists noted that even widely adopted transformative technologies may not generate sufficient financial returns quickly enough to justify the massive scale of investment many companies have committed to.
Oil prices fell early Thursday to levels below where they stood before the Iran war began in late February. Traders are hopeful that crude supplies will improve significantly with the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz — the narrow but critical waterway for global oil transport — though the number of ships passing through remains limited.
Brent crude, the international benchmark, fell 1% to $70.89 per barrel, dipping below the roughly $72 per barrel price seen before the war began. U.S. benchmark crude also fell 1%, settling at $67.91 per barrel.
In currency markets, the U.S. dollar traded at 162.39 Japanese yen, down slightly from 162.58 yen, a day after the yen sank to its lowest level against the dollar in four decades. The euro traded at $1.1387, up from $1.1377.
