On June 23, KLA Corporation fell 6% in pre-market trading, trading at $253.5/share, with turnover of $3.879 million. The decline follows a session on the prior trading day where the stock had risen over 3% to $263.41.
The semiconductor equipment sector is experiencing broad-based selling pressure, with ASML down 7.34%, AXT Inc down 9.69%, Teradyne down 6.28%, Applied Materials down 6.21%, and Lam Research down 6.01%. The sector-wide retreat comes amid intensifying profit-taking across the AI industry chain during Q2, as industrial capital moves to lock in gains following extended rallies driven by AI infrastructure spending narratives. Multiple factors are converging, including shareholders realizing floating profits at elevated valuations, institutional investors facing fund maturity or tax-related pressures triggering passive selling, and regulatory tightening on financing for high-valuation targets accelerating capital outflows.
Despite the near-term pullback, multiple investment banks recently raised KLA target prices, with Citi setting a $290 target citing structural NAND demand growth driven by agentic AI workloads.
(The above content is based on publicly available market information, generated by a program or algorithm, and is intended solely as a stock movement alert. It does not constitute investment advice or a basis for trading decisions.)
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