Sourcing from China raises eyebrows. Apple looks increasingly likely to source some of its storage chips from Yangtze Memory Technology Corp. (YMTC) which will raise eyebrows but at the end of the day, this is unlikely to be a particularly big issue. YMTC is a subsidiary of Tsinghua Unigroup which is a state-backed semiconductor company and from both companies, the...
SoftBank – Arm IPO. Arm China is holding up the relisting of Arm and the less-than-ideal solution that SoftBank is proposing highlights again my view that SoftBank may be better off holding onto Arm and relisting it another day. The situation between Arm and Arm China remains unresolved which has meant that Arm is unable to audit Arm China which...
Huawei puts a brave face on it. Huawei reported 2021 FY results that highlighted just how badly the company has been hit by US sanctions despite an effort to dress up the figures 2021 revenues / net income was RMB636.8bn (-28.6% YoY) / RMB113.7bn (+76% YoY) which was flattered by an RMB60.8bn gain from the sale of the Honor smartphone...
All change at games? There has been chatter for some time that Amazon’s new CEO will put his stamp upon the company by cutting back on some of its stranger products and projects but it looks like the knife is falling first on gaming. That is not to say that Amazon Game Studios is going to be cancelled, but its...
Tencent cheers its own demise. Tencent reported disappointing results in which it cheered the crackdown which has caused it so many problems and also declined to buy back any shares all of which caused the shares to fall. Q4 2021 revenues / EPS were RMB144.2bn / RMB9.79 compared to estimates of RMB146.5bn / RMB3.35. The much higher than expected EPS...
Nvidia builds barriers to entry. Nvidia is enhancing its claim to be the picks and shovels of the Metaverse and AI with the launch of its next-generation chips and services, that once again move it ahead of its competition and build barriers to entry. Top of the list was the announcement of a new GPU architecture called Hopper and alongside...
Alibaba moves to support the recovery. Alibaba has increased its share buyback in a move that should help put a bottom under the recent rout, while Tencent is likely to have a difficult set of results tomorrow and there is still regulatory (albeit declining) risk hanging over the company. Alibaba is breaking out one of the last tools in a...
Accounting gives GM an instant paper profit. General Motors is buying SoftBank out of its stake in Cruise in what will end as a good investment for SoftBank, but I still think that the valuations in this sector remain much too high. In 2018 SoftBank closed a two-tranche deal with Cruise where it purchased 11% for $900m and would then...
Magic Leap makes its pitch to stay in the game. Magic Leap has allowed reviewers to get an early look at its new device which is smaller, more powerful but still very far from anything that a consumer would pay for. This is why Magic Leap followed everyone else in focusing on the enterprise because productivity is far more important...
Richard is founder, owner of research company, Radio Free Mobile. He has 16 years of experience working in sell side equity research. During his 11 year tenure at Nomura Securities, he focused on the equity coverage of the Global Technology sector.
Semiconductors – Supercycle pt. IV
Three canaries burst into song. While the semiconductor companies are announcing record capital investment plans, there are signs that demand for components is starting to soften, highlighting the possibility that the semiconductor supercycle is beginning to peak. For the last year, demand and supply have been badly out of balance thanks to the coincidence of three factors: First, the pandemic:...