As of Tuesday's U.S. market close, semiconductor stocks - one of the core driving forces behind the long-term U.S. bull market since 2023 - posted strong gains, with the sector achieving its longest consecutive rally in nearly eight years. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM.US), known as the "chip foundry king," and global memory chip leader Micron Technology (MU.US) reached new all-time highs this week.
U.S. chip stocks recorded their longest consecutive winning period since 2017, driven by AI-powered growth momentum and investment enthusiasm. Looking ahead, research reports from Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs and the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization suggest that amid this unprecedented global AI investment boom, semiconductor stocks could remain among the best-performing technology sectors in U.S. markets from a long-term investment perspective.
During this period of global semiconductor "super bull market" performance, particularly as AI training and inference system-related semiconductor stocks surge, Goldman Sachs' latest semiconductor industry research report adds fuel to the already intense AI bullish sentiment. Following the firm's Communacopia + Technology conference covering top global semiconductor companies, Goldman Sachs research team maintained their view of an "AI-driven structural bull market" in the semiconductor industry.
As of Tuesday's close, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange Semiconductor Index - considered the benchmark for U.S. chip stocks and a "global semiconductor bellwether" - rose just 0.3%, marking nine consecutive trading days of gains and the longest winning streak since 2017. The index gained 8.7% during these nine trading days, with year-to-date gains of 22%, significantly outperforming the Nasdaq 100's approximately 16% gain over the same period.
Among notable individual components of the index, Amkor Technology (AMKR.US) surged over 5%, ON Semiconductor (ON.US) gained 3%, Intel (INTC.US) rose 2%, and Applied Materials (AMAT.US) advanced 1.5%. While AI chip leader NVIDIA (NVDA.US) declined 1.6%, it maintains over 30% year-to-date gains. Broadcom (AVGO.US), another high-flying chip stock that has repeatedly hit record highs this year, fell 1.1% but remains up an impressive 55% in 2025.
Taiwan Semiconductor reached a new all-time high on Tuesday, with its ADR performance ranking second only to Broadcom among U.S. chip stocks this year. In the semiconductor supply chain, TSMC stands as an irreplaceable leader, with booming AI GPU and AI ASIC demand depending heavily on the company. Leveraging decades of chip manufacturing expertise and cutting-edge technology innovation, TSMC dominates global foundry orders with advanced processes, packaging technologies, and superior yields, particularly for 5nm and below advanced node manufacturing.
U.S.-based memory giant Micron Technology has been on a tremendous run since September, benefiting from robust demand for core memory chips related to AI training and inference systems, explosive HBM memory system demand growth, and pricing increases across enterprise SSD and DDR series data center memory products. Micron has gained 35% since September and hit an all-time high this Monday.
Citigroup reiterated its "Buy" rating on Micron and raised its price target from $140 to $175. Mizuho increased its Micron price target even more dramatically, from $155 to $182.
"Everything we're seeing in AI infrastructure buildout and across the technology sector is essentially being driven by semiconductor-related stocks," said Wayne Kaufman, chief market analyst at Phoenix Financial Services. He added that Oracle's recent strong earnings and Microsoft's multi-billion dollar AI infrastructure deal with Nebius Group NV are positive signals for the global chip sector.
"Companies are placing very long-term AI infrastructure orders, indicating they feel they could quickly fall behind in meeting AI computational infrastructure needs," Kaufman noted in an interview. "This suggests the semiconductor rally looks highly sustainable, even if some stocks may experience short-term overbought corrections. Giants like NVIDIA and TSMC will remain the biggest winners."
Since 2025 began, AI computational infrastructure-related chip stocks have been among the most consistent winners in global markets. According to institutional data, NVIDIA, Broadcom, TSMC, and Micron have contributed over 65% of this year's gains in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index.
Undoubtedly, Oracle's recently announced contract backlog of $455 billion - far exceeding market expectations - and global AI ASIC chip leader Broadcom's strong performance and forward guidance last week have significantly reinforced the "long-term bull market narrative" for AI GPU, ASIC, and HBM AI computational infrastructure sectors.
The AI computational demand driven by generative AI applications and AI agent-dominated inference represents a vast opportunity, potentially driving exponential growth in AI computational infrastructure markets. "AI inference systems" represent what Jensen Huang considers NVIDIA's largest future revenue source.
Continued explosive global AI computational demand, increasingly massive U.S. government-led AI infrastructure investment projects, and tech giants' ongoing massive investments in large data center construction largely suggest that for investors long committed to NVIDIA and the AI computational supply chain, the global "AI faith" driving "super catalytic" effects on computational leaders' stock prices is far from over. They're betting that AI computational supply chain companies led by NVIDIA, TSMC, and Broadcom will continue their "bull market trajectory," further driving global stock market rallies.
Goldman Sachs reports that semiconductor companies focused on AI computational infrastructure remain highly optimistic overall, with AI-related revenue expected to increase significantly over the next two years as enterprise AI workloads are increasingly handled by large-scale "merchant solutions."
Non-AI related areas still face inventory and weak demand digestion, with Goldman Sachs noting potential short-term volatility impacts on the semiconductor sector. At the Communacopia + Technology conference, Broadcom CEO Hock Tan predicted AI-related revenue would exceed combined software and non-AI business revenue within two years. Broadcom management also set a goal of up to $120 billion in AI revenue by fiscal 2030, directly tied to CEO compensation.
According to Goldman Sachs research, this latest outlook represents a five-fold increase from the firm's $20 billion fiscal 2025 AI revenue prediction for Broadcom, highlighting management's extreme confidence in AI ASIC chip revenue generation.
Applied Materials President and CEO Gary Dickerson stated at the same conference that HBM and advanced packaging manufacturing equipment would be strong medium to long-term growth vectors, while new chip manufacturing node equipment like GAA (Gate-All-Around) and backside power delivery (BPD) would drive the company's next strong growth phase.
Regarding advanced packaging manufacturing equipment specifically, Dickerson indicated revenue doubling trajectory remains on track with massive incremental gains approaching, continued HBM equipment market share expansion, and increasing relevance to DRAM etching innovation.
Investment giants Loop Capital and Wedbush believe the global AI infrastructure investment wave centered on AI computational hardware is far from over, currently only in its early stages. Under the unprecedented "AI computational demand storm," this AI investment wave could reach $2 trillion in scale.
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang predicted AI infrastructure spending would reach $3-4 trillion by 2030, with project scale and scope providing significant long-term growth opportunities for NVIDIA.
Led by epic stock price surges and consistently strong performance from AI computational supply chain leaders like NVIDIA, Google, TSMC, and Broadcom, an unprecedented AI investment boom has swept U.S. and global stock markets, driving the global benchmark MSCI World Index significantly higher since April and continuously reaching new all-time highs.
Recent World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) data shows global chip demand recovery expected to continue through 2025-2026, with analog chips - which have experienced weak demand since late 2022 - potentially entering strong recovery soon.
WSTS projects 11.2% growth in the global semiconductor market for 2025 following 2024's strong rebound, reaching $700.9 billion in total value, primarily driven by continued strong momentum in GPU-dominated logic chips and HBM-dominated memory sectors. Both areas are expected to achieve strong double-digit growth due to sustained robust demand from AI inference systems, cloud computing infrastructure, and advanced consumer electronics.
WSTS forecasts the global semiconductor market will grow 8.5% in 2026 following 2025's strong recovery, reaching $760.7 billion, with memory chips expected to again lead growth while logic and analog chips contribute significantly, with analog chips potentially entering a strong recovery cycle.
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