🚀 TSMC with record profits

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Market Overview
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Year To Date Performances:

1. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) shares gained on Thursday after the world's largest contract chipmaker reported a record-breaking second-quarter net profit of $21.95 billion, marking an astronomical 77.4% year-over-year surge that easily smashed Wall Street expectations. Fueled by demand for high-performance artificial intelligence chips from major clients like Nvidia and Apple, quarterly revenue climbed 36% to $39.45 billion, with advanced technologies—specifically 7-nanometer processes and below—accounting for 77% of all wafer sales. Capitalizing on this strong momentum, Chairman C.C. Wei announced that TSMC will invest an additional $100 billion to construct multiple new 2-nanometer logic and advanced packaging fabs in Arizona, elevating the company's total planned investment in the state to a staggering $265 billion. Alongside the massive factory expansion, management raised its full-year revenue growth outlook to slightly above 40% and lifted its 2026 capital expenditure budget to between $60 billion and $64 billion, underscoring its immense pricing power and deep commitment to bridging the persistent supply-demand gap in the global semiconductor ecosystem.

2. Shares of Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Baidu surged 5% and 4% respectively in Hong Kong trading after the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) granted regulatory approval for Apple Intelligence to launch in the country, officially clearing a massive two-year hurdle. To comply with Beijing's strict local AI and data-privacy regulations, Apple has bypassed its Western partners like OpenAI and Google to integrate homegrown Chinese systems, establishing a model-sharing alliance where Alibaba’s Qwen (Tongyi Qianwen) will serve as the primary generative AI engine across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and visionOS, while Baidu will power specialized search and Visual Intelligence features. This highly anticipated regulatory breakthrough not only promises to boost Apple's market recovery against domestic rivals like Huawei, but also provides a monumental distribution channel for Alibaba and Baidu, positioning their models as the default AI assistant tools for hundreds of millions of affluent Chinese smartphone users.

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4. The United States has finalized a 25% tariff on most imports from Brazil effective July 22, concluding a yearlong Section 301 investigation into what Washington deems "unfair trade practices". Spearheaded by the Trump administration after the Supreme Court struck down previous broad tariffs in February, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) cited lax anti-corruption enforcement, barriers to digital trade, Brazil's state-backed instant payment system Pix, and illegal deforestation as key drivers of the trade penalty. While the new duties will impact billions of dollars in goods such as sugar, steel, and machinery, Washington has carved out exemptions for supply-critical imports including beef, coffee, orange juice, aerospace components, and energy products. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva strongly condemned the unilateral move as baseless, noting that the U.S. has enjoyed a cumulative $424.5 billion USD trade surplus with Brazil over 15 years, and promised retaliatory countermeasures under the WTO dispute settlement framework. Tensions are set to remain high as Secretary of State Marco Rubio publicly accused Lula of negotiating in bad faith, and a pending U.S. forced-labor investigation due next week could slap an additional 12.5% tariff on Brazilian goods, driving total potential duties up to 37.5%.

   Headlines

   1. Bank of Korea rose interest rates to 2.75% earlier this week in it’s first rate hike in over three years.

   2. The Bank of Canada held it’s interest rate earlier this week.

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