From Bloomberg tonight:
Chipmakers fell after the Nikkei reported the spot price --
or price for immediate delivery -- for the 64-megabit chips used
as main memory in personal computers has plunged to a record low
of $6.70 a chip, down 17 percent from the end of March.
Micron Technology Inc. of the U.S. as well as German and
Taiwanese manufacturers have begun to offer synchronous dynamic
random-access memory chips or DRAMS at the $6 level, Nikkei said.
NEC Corp., Japan's biggest maker of microchips, fell 27 yen
to 1,389. Fujitsu Ltd. shed 16 yen to 1,999. Toshiba Corp. fell 2
yen to 798.
''We had thought Japan's chipmakers would be able to make
some money on DRAMs this fiscal year, but the issue's basically
already settled,'' said Yohei Kanazawa, a senior analyst at Daiwa
Institute of Research Ltd.
Korea
Chipmakers were also active as Korea's Kospi index rose 2.79
to 813.41. Samsung Electronics Co., the world's largest computer
memory chipmaker, gained as investors judged it will suffer less
that its rivals from the plunge in the price DRAMS. Samsung
shares rose 2 percent to 97,300 won.
Still, Hyundai Electronics Industries Co. and LG Semicon
Co., which will soon combine to form the world's largest DRAM
producer by production capacity, fell. Hyundai shares fell 4.7
percent to 18,100 won and LG Semicon lost 2.3 percent to 10,550
won. Analysts estimate that chip prices may have fallen below the
price it costs the two to produce them.
Declines by chipmakers limited gains by Taiwan's TWSE stock
index, which rose 15.04 to 7484.37. Taiwan Semiconductor
Manufacturing Co. and chipmakers fell for a second time after
foreign investors sold the shares more than any other stocks on
Friday.
Foreign investors sold a net 7.6 million of TSMC shares, 8.2
million shares of United Microelectronics Corp. and 9.8 million
shares of Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc. TSMC fell 0.9
percent to NT$105, narrowing its rise to 46 percent so far this
year. ASE dropped 3.3 percent to NT$74.5.
Taiwanese memory chip makers are smaller than their Korean
and Japanese rivals and are less able to take advantage of
economies of scale, some analysts said.
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