The Nasdaq 100 fell more than 6% as chips led a post-midterm selloff. Micron suspended its 2028 Taiwan fab, Microsoft reportedly tightened oversight of Nebius, IREN and Nscale as CoreWeave CDS hit a record, and Moonshot AI reportedly sought Blackwell capacity in Europe.
Per FirstSquawk, the Nasdaq 100 sank more than 6% and the S&P 500 fell 3.7%; Kobeissi Letter said the post-midterm rally was erased and put the VIX up over 70%, on track for its biggest daily gain since February 2018. SanDisk, Western Digital, Nebius, AMD and Seagate were down 12% to 15% early, and Schuldensuehner put the SOX 37% below its peak amid fears of tighter AI regulation.
Micron suspended construction of Fab 11E in Taoyuan after a labor dispute, per The Valueist; the plant was slated for HBM and DRAM and due online in 2028, while existing Taiwan operations, 60% of Micron's DRAM output, continue. Jukan reads it as less supply in 2028. Separately, Jukan relayed a veteran investor's view that memory LTAs are basically meaningless and memory stocks are not cheap even at a P/E of 3.
Per FinancialJuice, Microsoft is increasing oversight of Nebius, IREN and Nscale over data center delays and costs, has withdrawn from three Nscale projects, and its delays are reportedly linked to an IREN facility in Texas. CoreWeave's five-year credit default swaps widened to an all-time high of 1,164.52 bp, per LiveSquawk, and Jim Cramer noted CoreWeave's 8.5% notes due July 2032 trading at 73.
Per CNBC, China's Moonshot AI explored renting clusters of 8,000 or more Nvidia Blackwell GPUs in European data centers, and Kimi reportedly offered to pay 30% to 50% more upfront than buyers outside China. Reuters sources say about 600,000 H200 chips are in Hong Kong awaiting shipment to mainland China, which has yet to approve large-quantity imports. Andrew Curran expects the remote-access loophole to close soon given the midterm results.
@crypto_chase reported half fills on long-term buys of Micron at $660 and SanDisk at $808, and filled half of an Nvidia order after moving the level to about $181.
@thebigberbowski added Nebius at $120, Applied Optoelectronics at $48 and Meta at $591.
Paradis Labs said it is gently dipping a toe back into semis, citing cleaner AI positioning after last week's de-leveraging and compressed valuations while EPS is expected to accelerate in 2027.
Jukan said that after a trip to Shanghai he no longer has conviction on memory, and relayed a veteran investor's view that uncertain 2028 operating profit caps memory valuations.
@firstadopter, publicly bearish on Cerebras since the IPO, said he is no longer negative at $83 and sides with Cerebras over Culper Research on wafer lifespans.
@dampedspring closed the long-bond leg near 109 on ZB, took a little profit on the remaining equity position and says he is still very short.
@au_xbt rotated capital into gold and is using part of it to short semiconductors, saying SOXL could drop to 40, when he would consider rotating back into equities.