Taiwan’s Taiex fell 0.65% Monday following steep losses in U.S. technology shares, while a minister said concerns about returns on artificial intelligence spending would affect local stocks only briefly.
The benchmark closed at 44,920.14 points, down 291.69 points from its Oct. 30 close, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed. It fell as low as 44,399.10 during Monday’s session before recovering some of its losses. In Friday’s U.S. session, the Nasdaq Composite lost 2.86% and the PHLX Semiconductor Sector Index dropped 7.20%.
National Development Council Minister Yeh Chun-hsien said Taiwan’s hardware manufacturers had orders through the end of 2027 and faced no funding or cash-flow problems, CNA reported from his Nov. 1 remarks. His assessment addresses a concern for investors: whether the companies buying AI infrastructure will earn enough from it to sustain their spending.
Taiwan’s Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics said demand for AI infrastructure has led domestic suppliers to expand capacity, while major cloud providers face pressure on free cash flow.
Results from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) show the scale of recent demand at one supplier. The chipmaker reported NT$763.06 billion in net income for the quarter ended Sept. 30, up 68.7% from a year earlier. It expects revenue to grow about 44% in U.S. dollar terms for 2026. Those company figures do not establish the order outlook for Taiwan’s hardware industry as a whole.
The statistics office estimated that Taiwan’s real gross domestic product grew 14.36% from a year earlier in the third quarter. Its August forecast put full-year 2026 growth at 11.05%. Yeh separately said he thought growth of roughly 12% was achievable, CNA reported.
The statistics office plans to release another preliminary estimate of third-quarter GDP later in November. It has not specified a date.
