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To: Return to Sender who wrote (88912)	11/10/2022 11:35:23 AM
From: Return to Sender	Respond to of 95342

Used today's strength to take some profits on my latest swing trades. RtS

To: Return to Sender who wrote (88912)	8/21/2023 8:40:17 AM
From: Return to Sender	1 Recommendation Recommended By The Ox Respond to of 95342

The Big Picture Last Updated: 18-Aug-23 06:48 ET \| Archive Striking better balance with interest rate shift Interest rates are rising. That is not a new revelation, and it should not be a shock to anyone who has been watching the market for the past few years. The increase in rates has occurred in response to rising inflation, which has necessitated higher policy rates. Again, not a shock to anyone who has been watching the market for the past few years. What may be a shock to anyone who has been watching the market only the past few years is that interest rates aren't as bad as they look. It is the pace at which they have risen that has made them feel bad, but the level of rates themselves is, well, closer to normal before things became abnormal during the 2008 financial crisis. Tables Have Turned All else equal, lower interest rates are better for stocks than higher interest rates, but higher interest rates aren't necessarily a death knell for stocks, particularly if they are driven by stronger than expected economic activity that is good for corporate profit growth. Higher interest rates, however, create more competition for stocks. They lower the present value of future cash flows and raise the appeal of parking capital in less risky investments like money market funds, highly rated corporate bonds, certificates of deposit, and risk-free Treasuries. That is why when interest rates were languishing at such low levels during the abnormal, post-2008 period, which got even more abnormal with the COVID response, one often heard the refrain that "there is no alternative" to stocks. That refrain was dubbed "TINA." Because market rates and policy rates were so low, savings rates offered by financial institutions were a joke, certificate of deposit rates and money market rates were unappealing, and corporate bond yields forced investors down the quality ladder to get a decent return. The tables, though, have turned. Spreadin' the News You can find yields north of 5.00% in the Treasury market, in higher-quality corporate bonds, in CDs, in money market funds, and even in some savings accounts. Of course, that still pales in comparison to the S&P 500, which is up 13.8% for the year as of this writing. Anyone watching the stock market this year, though, knows that return has been cooked so to speak by the outsized gains in a small group of mega-cap stocks. The Invesco S&P 500 Equal-Weight ETF (RSP) is up 4.1% for the year with a higher risk profile than the yield vehicles noted above. We have made the point in the past, however, that a gain... is a gain... is a gain in the market-cap weighted S&P 500. They aren't going to discount you at the door when you sell the S&P 500 just because its outperformance has been juiced by a small group of stocks. The latter point notwithstanding, one assumes a higher risk of capital loss in stocks, so an investment decision between stocks and other instruments boils down to one's risk tolerance over a specified time horizon. The problem in the abnormal past is that it was a struggle to get real returns in anything other than stocks. That is no longer the case. What we see today, too, is that the trailing twelve-month earnings yield for the S&P 500 (4.95%) is less than 70 basis points higher than the yield on the risk-free 10-yr note (4.30%) and is comparable to the yield on the 2-yr note. The translation is that equity investors aren't necessarily getting compensated as generously as in the past for taking the added risk of owning stocks. In the abnormal period between 2008 and early 2020, the earnings yield spread over the 10-yr note ranged from 160 to 700 basis points. What It All Means It is pretty clear to anyone watching the stock market this year that it has defied most people's expectations. As we discussed last week, the big run through July has given way to a consolidation period in August, and the bid to trim positions has been encouraged by the jump in long-term rates seen this month. That is creating competition for stocks, and dare we say, a more normal opportunity for income-oriented investors and investors with a lower risk tolerance. Importantly for the investor class, it creates an opportunity to strike a better balance and to lower risk in investment portfolios. That's not a bad thing. Some might even call it a return to normalcy after an extended period of abnormally low interest rates. -- Patrick J. O'Hare, Briefing.com

To: Return to Sender who wrote (88912)

12/14/2023 10:16:59 AM

From: Return to Sender

1 Recommendation

Recommended By
The Ox

Respond to of 95342

Aehr Receives First Order for FOX™ Wafer Level Test and Burn-in System to be used for Gallium Nitride Semiconductor Engineering and Qualification

aehr.com

Fremont, CA (December 14, 2023) – Aehr Test Systems (NASDAQ: AEHR), a worldwide supplier of semiconductor test and burn-in equipment, today announced it has received an initial customer order for a FOX-NP™ wafer level test and burn-in system and a FOX WaferPak™ Aligner to be used for gallium nitride (GaN) power devices. The customer is a leading global supplier of semiconductor devices used in electric vehicles and power infrastructure and adds another major customer to the list of companies using Aehr’s FOX products for wafer level test and burn-in of wide bandgap compound semiconductors. The FOX-NP system, including the FOX WaferPak Aligner, is scheduled to ship and be installed in the current fiscal quarter.

As Aehr’s first gallium nitride customer to order a system, this company selected Aehr due in part to its unique ability to offer a total solution that allows customers to apply thermal and electrical stress conditions to thousands of devices while still in wafer form. Aehr’s cutting-edge technology provides critical geolocation information across the wafer while inducing the extrinsic (early life) failures that would otherwise fail in the field without reducing the long-term reliability or life of the good devices.

Gayn Erickson, President and CEO of Aehr Test Systems, commented, “After seeing the positive results from their long and extensive evaluation of our FOX wafer level test systems for their silicon carbide devices, this customer decided to first move forward with our FOX-NP system to test their gallium nitride devices’ long-term reliability failure rates, as well as qualify the production extrinsic failure screening process for their devices in applications where safety, reliability, and/or security are critical. A key consideration behind their decision is that the FOX-NP system is 100% compatible with the Aehr FOX-XP system that is targeted for high volume production and can support all the test modes needed for both gallium nitride and silicon carbide device testing and burn-in, including high-voltage testing of up to 2,000 volts with full wafer test without electrical arcing that can damage the wafer, which is a distinct advantage of our unique patented technology.

“Similar to silicon carbide, gallium nitride semiconductor MOSFETs are considered wide bandgap devices with much higher efficiencies in terms of power conversion than silicon, with gallium nitride being particularly good for lower power devices such as under 1000 watt power converters used in consumer devices such as cell phones, tablets, and laptop computers, as well as being targeted for automotive power converters for all the electrical systems in automobiles, whether electric vehicles or traditional gasoline automobiles. Gallium nitride MOSFETs are also believed by many industry analysts and technical communities to likely take over silicon as the power converter of choice for photovoltaic (solar panel) applications.

“Gallium nitride and silicon carbide devices both have excellent long-term intrinsic reliability, making them very good for automotive and industrial applications. But both also experience higher than acceptable early life or extrinsic failures related to the material and processing steps. Gallium nitride and silicon carbide semiconductor suppliers can add a special stress or screening test known as burn-in on 100% of the devices to identify and remove these early life failures so that they can meet the end customers’ target reliability needs. This 100% burn-in requirement is not unique to these devices, as it is also the case with microprocessors and microcontrollers, dynamic random-access memories (DRAM), flash non-volatile memories, as well as many sensors used in automotive and other industrial applications.”

Aehr enables its customers to cost-effectively implement the needed testing and qualification process for semiconductor devices that experience early life failures by not only applying the electrical stress condition to every device on the wafer but by also testing up to 18 wafers at a time using the FOX-XP production test and burn in system. These electrical tests are done with up to thousands of precise calibrated electrical source and measurement instruments per wafer. These tests are done while maintaining the temperature at an accurately programmed thermal temperature across each of the wafers using a direct conduction thermal transfer via a proprietary patented precision thermal chuck per wafer.

The FOX-NP compliments Aehr’s production FOX-XP system by using the exact same test ‘Blades’ that are in the FOX-XP to allow 100% correlation between the results on the FOX-NP to the FOX-XP.

The FOX-XP and FOX-NP systems, available with multiple WaferPak Contactors (full wafer test) or multiple DiePakTM Carriers (singulated die/module test) configurations, are capable of functional test and burn-in/cycling of devices such as silicon carbide and gallium nitride power semiconductors, silicon photonics as well as other optical devices, 2D and 3D sensors, flash memories, magnetic sensors, microcontrollers, and other leading-edge ICs in either wafer form factor, before they are assembled into single or multi-die stacked packages, or in singulated die or module form factor.

About Aehr Test Systems
Headquartered in Fremont, California, Aehr Test Systems is a leading provider of test solutions for testing, burning-in, and stabilizing semiconductor devices in wafer level, singulated die, and package part form, and has installed thousands of systems worldwide. Increasing quality, reliability, safety, and security needs of semiconductors used across multiple applications, including electric vehicles, electric vehicle charging infrastructure, solar and wind power, computing, data and telecommunications infrastructure, and solid-state memory and storage, are driving additional test requirements, incremental capacity needs, and new opportunities for Aehr Test products and solutions. Aehr has developed and introduced several innovative products including the FOX-PTM families of test and burn-in systems and FOX WaferPakTM Aligner, FOX WaferPak Contactor, FOX DiePak® Carrier and FOX DiePak Loader. The FOX-XP and FOX-NP systems are full wafer contact and singulated die/module test and burn-in systems that can test, burn-in, and stabilize a wide range of devices such as leading-edge silicon carbide-based and other power semiconductors, 2D and 3D sensors used in mobile phones, tablets, and other computing devices, memory semiconductors, processors, microcontrollers, systems-on-a-chip, and photonics and integrated optical devices. The FOX-CP system is a low-cost single-wafer compact test solution for logic, memory and photonic devices and the newest addition to the FOX-P product family. The FOX WaferPak Contactor contains a unique full wafer contactor capable of testing wafers up to 300mm that enables IC manufacturers to perform test, burn-in, and stabilization of full wafers on the FOX-P systems. The FOX DiePak Carrier allows testing, burning in, and stabilization of singulated bare die and modules up to 1024 devices in parallel per DiePak on the FOX-NP and FOX-XP systems up to nine DiePaks at a time. For more information, please visit Aehr Test Systems’ website at www.aehr.com.

Safe Harbor Statement
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Forward-looking statements generally relate to future events or Aehr’s future financial or operating performance. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements because they contain words such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expects,” “plans,” “anticipates,” “going to,” “could,” “intends,” “target,” “projects,” “contemplates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential,” or “continue,” or the negative of these words or other similar terms or expressions that concern Aehr’s expectations, strategy, priorities, plans, or intentions. Forward-looking statements in this press release include, but are not limited to, future requirements and orders of Aehr’s new and existing customers; bookings forecasted for proprietary WaferPakTM and DiePak consumables; and expectations related to long-term demand for Aehr’s productions and the attractiveness of key markets. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are also subject to other risks and uncertainties, including those more fully described in Aehr’s recent Form 10-K, 10-Q and other reports filed from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Aehr disclaims any obligation to update information contained in any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances occurring after the date of this press release.

Contacts:
Aehr Test Systems Vernon Rogers EVP Sales and Marketing (510) 623-9400 x215 vrogers@aehr.com	MKR Investor Relations Inc. Todd Kehrli or Jim Byers Analyst/Investor Contact (323) 468-2300 aehr@mkr-group.com