Japan's Nikkei ends flat as election, tariff worries overshadow chip stocks' gains
ADVERTISEMENT The Nikkei inched 0.04% lower at 39,663.4. The broader Topix fell 0.21% to 2,819.4.
"Investors have excuses for not buying or selling stocks," said Shigetoshi Kamada, general manager at the research department at Tachibana Securities.
"They are cautiously awaiting the outcome of the upper house election, while the outlook of the trade talks between is not clear even as the deadline approaches." Opinion surveys suggest Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's coalition may lose its majority in the elections scheduled for July 20, forcing it to court an array of smaller parties pushing for easier fiscal and monetary policy. Chip-related heavyweights Tokyo Electron and Advantest rose 1.75% and 0.64%, respectively, to track Nvidia's 4% gain overnight.
ADVERTISEMENT Nvidia unveiled plans to resume sales of its H20 AI chip to China, pushing the Nasdaq Composite to end at another record high. Toho jumped 10.09% after the creator of the "Godzilla" movie franchise raised its annual net profit forecast.
ADVERTISEMENT
Uniqlo-brand owner Fast Retailing slipped 0.91% to weigh on the Nikkei the most.
Toyota Motor lost 0.89% even as the yen fell to a more than three-month low against the dollar.
ADVERTISEMENT
"Investors could not buy Toyota despite the yen's weakness because they are concerned about the tariff negotiations," said Kamada.
Local media reported Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is arranging to meet with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in Tokyo on Friday ahead of an August 1 deadline to strike a trade deal with the United States, else face punishing tariff of 25%.
(You can now subscribe to our ETMarkets WhatsApp channel)
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Indian Express
16 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Nvidia's China restart faces production obstacles: Report
Nvidia has told its Chinese customers it has limited supplies of H20 chips, the most powerful AI chip it had been allowed to sell to China under U.S. export restrictions, The Information reported on Saturday. Nvidia said this week that it was planning to resume sales of the H20 chips to China, though under the policy change the U.S. must still approve licenses for the export of the chips. The U.S. government's April ban on sales of the H20 chips had forced Nvidia to void customer orders and cancel manufacturing capacity it had booked at chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSMC), said the report in tech publication The Information, citing two people with knowledge of the matter. TSMC had shifted its H20 production lines to produce other chips for other customers, and manufacturing new chips from scratch could take nine months, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said at a media event in Beijing this week, according to the report. The report also said Nvidia did not plan to restart production, without citing any sources or giving details. Nvidia declined to comment on the report. Reuters could not immediately verify the report. Huang made comments in recent days suggesting Nvidia would ramp up supply of H20 chips, and that licenses for Chinese orders would be approved swiftly. Nvidia has also announced that it is developing a new chip for Chinese clients called the RTX Pro GPU, which would be compliant with U.S. export restrictions.
Mint
16 minutes ago
- Mint
Jensen Huang, AI visionary in a leather jacket
Unknown to the general public just three years ago, Jensen Huang is now one of the most powerful entrepreneurs in the world as head of chip giant Nvidia. The unassuming 62-year-old draws stadium crowds of more than 10,000 people as his company's products push the boundaries of artificial intelligence. Chips designed by Nvidia, known as graphics cards or GPUs (Graphics Processing Units), are essential in developing the generative artificial intelligence powering technology like ChatGPT. Big tech's insatiable appetite for Nvidia's GPUs, which sell for tens of thousands of dollars each, has catapulted the California chipmaker beyond $4 trillion in market valuation, the first company ever to surpass that mark. Nvidia's meteoric rise has boosted Huang's personal fortune to $150 billion -- making him one of the world's richest people -- thanks to the roughly 3.5 percent stake he holds in the company he founded three decades ago with two friends in a Silicon Valley diner. In a clear demonstration of his clout, he recently convinced President Donald Trump to lift restrictions on certain GPU exports to China, despite the fact that China is locked in a battle with the United States for AI supremacy. "That was brilliantly done," said Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a governance professor at Yale University. Huang was able to explain to Trump that "having the world using a US tech platform as the core protocol is definitely in the interest of this country" and won't help the Chinese military, Sonnenfeld said. Born in Taipei in 1963, Jensen Huang (originally named Jen-Hsun) embodies the American success story. At nine years old, he was sent away with his brother to boarding school in small-town Kentucky. His uncle recommended the school to his Taiwanese parents believing it to be a prestigious institution, when it was actually a school for troubled youth. Too young to be a student, Huang boarded there but attended a nearby public school alongside the children of tobacco farmers. With his poor English, he was bullied and forced to clean toilets -- a two-year ordeal that transformed him. "We worked really hard, we studied really hard, and the kids were really tough," he recounted in an interview with US broadcaster NPR. But "the ending of the story is I loved the time I was there," Huang said. Brought home by his parents, who had by then settled in the northwestern US state of Oregon, he graduated from university at just 20 and joined AMD, then LSI Logic, to design chips -- his passion. But he wanted to go further and founded Nvidia in 1993 to "solve problems that normal computers can't," using semiconductors powerful enough to handle 3D graphics, as he explained on the "No Priors" podcast. Nvidia created the first GPU in 1999, riding the intersection of video games, data centers, cloud computing, and now, generative AI. Always dressed in a black T-shirt and leather jacket, Huang sports a Nvidia logo tattoo and has a taste for sports cars. But it's his relentless optimism, low-key personality and lack of political alignment that sets him apart from the likes of Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. Unlike them, Huang was notably absent from Trump's inauguration ceremony. "He backpedals his own aura and has the star be the technology rather than himself," observed Sonnenfeld, who believes Huang may be "the most respected of all today's tech titans." One former high-ranking Nvidia employee described him to AFP as "the most driven person" he'd ever met. On visits to his native Taiwan, Huang is treated like a megastar, with fans crowding him for autographs and selfies as journalists follow him to the barber shop and his favorite night market. "He has created the phenomena because of his personal charm," noted Wayne Lin of Witology Market Trend Research Institute. "A person like him must be very busy and his schedule should be full every day meeting big bosses. But he remembers to eat street food when he comes to Taiwan," he said, calling Huang "unusually friendly." Nvidia is a tight ship and takes great care to project a drama-free image of Huang. But the former high-ranking employee painted a more nuanced picture, describing a "very paradoxical" individual who is fiercely protective of his employees but also capable, within Nvidia's executive circle, of "ripping people to shreds" over major mistakes or poor choices.
NDTV
2 hours ago
- NDTV
Japan Heads To Polls Amid Rising Prices, Immigration Concerns
Japanese voters could unleash political turmoil as they head to the polls on Sunday in a tightly contested upper house election, with rising prices and immigration concerns threatening to weaken Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's grip on power. Opinion polls suggest Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party and coalition partner Komeito may fall short of the 50 seats needed to retain control of the 248-seat upper house of parliament in an election where half the seats are up for grabs. The polls show smaller opposition parties pushing for tax cuts and increased public spending are set to gain, among them the right-wing Sanseito, which vows to curb immigration, oppose foreign capital inflows and reverse gender equality moves. A poor showing by the coalition could shake investor confidence in the world's fourth-largest economy and disrupt critical trade talks with the United States, analysts said. Ishiba may have to choose between making way for a new LDP leader or scrambling to secure the backing of some opposition parties with policy compromises, said Rintaro Nishimura, an associate at the Asia Group in Japan. "Each scenario requires the LDP and Komeito to make certain concessions, and will be challenging, as any potential partner has leverage in the negotiations." After the election, Japan faces a deadline of August 1 to strike a trade deal with the United States or face punishing tariffs in its largest export market. Such import levies could squeeze the economy and further pressure the government to give financial relief to households already reeling from inflation, such as a doubling of rice prices since last year. With an eye on a jittery government bond market, the LDP has called for fiscal restraint, rejecting opposition calls for major tax cuts and welfare spending to soften the blow. Ishiba's administration lost its majority in the more powerful lower house in October. That was the LDP's worst showing in 15 years, roiling financial markets and leaving the prime minister vulnerable to no-confidence motions that could topple his administration and trigger a fresh general election. Ruled by the LDP for most of the post-war period, Japan has so far largely avoided the social division and fracturing of politics seen in other industrialised democracies. Voting ends at 8:00 pm (1100 GMT), when the media are expected to project results based on exit polls.
