Global AI trade roars back as Meta’s personal agent fuels optimism
Shares of South Korean chipmakers Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc. were up about 3.5% early in the session, while Taiwan’s Taiex advanced 1.8% to a record. Overnight, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange Semiconductor Index closed up 4.3%, the biggest one-day rally since Aug. 4, while Meta shares jumped 11%.
BloombergThe rally followed Meta’s Muse AI agent climbing to the top of Apple’s free-app rankings shortly after its launch earlier this month. The strong debut is helping revive confidence in the AI trade after concerns over lofty valuations and more recently, the existential threat posed by advanced models. Muse’s early traction offers fresh evidence that demand remains robust.
“Markets (have) quickly grasped that this isn’t simply a product success story — it’s a repricing of the structural demand for AI compute,” said Dilin Wu, a strategist at Pepperstone. Mass adoption of Muse could significantly lift demand across the AI infrastructure supply chain, making chipmakers a key beneficiary of the trend, she added.
Lower oil prices, driven by hopes for diplomatic progress in the Iran war, further added to risk appetite. Investors are also looking ahead to a meeting between President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping later this week that could help ease geopolitical tensions and support sentiment.
In Asia, some of the biggest stock gainers came from Taiwanese AI supply-chain companies. MediaTek Inc. gained 9.4% to a record, while Unimicron Technology Corp. and Nan Ya Printed Circuit Board Corp. each jumped by their daily limit. Memory names also rallied in onshore China, helping lift the Star 50 Index by more than 2%. Tencent Holdings Ltd. rose as investors bet the social media giant could unlock similar AI-driven opportunities on its WeChat platform.
In Korea, the Kospi Index trimmed its earlier advance to 1.6% as retail investors sold, suggesting some are taking the advance as an opportunity to take profit on expectations that the rebound ahead will be choppy.The rally in Taiwan’s market “reflects growing confidence that hyperscalers will continue scaling their proprietary chips as AI adoption accelerates,” said Gary Tan, a portfolio manager at Allspring Global Investments.
“If products like Muse gain traction, hyperscalers will need more compute capacity, further accelerating demand for custom AI chips and supporting Taiwan’s ASIC ecosystem,” he added.
