Kospi −8.5%, TSMC Record, QQQ on Support: Morning 10
AI Trade — Kospi −8.5%, Nikkei −4.7% after hot US inflation; TSMC beats, Nasdaq-100 on support
TSMC posts a sixth record quarter with gross margin at 66.4%, but Asia sells chips hard. QQQ fell 2.0% to 728.95 and sits on a major support line; below it, the September low is 3.4% away.
In this edition
The Morning 10 Thu, Oct 15, 2026 ~90 seconds 08:00 CET
The ten points
Asia sold the AI hardware trade hard overnight. The Kospi fell 8.5% to about 5,500 and trading was halted for 20 minutes; SK Hynix lost about 11% and Samsung about 10%. The Nikkei dropped 4.7% and Taiwan 3.4%, as reported, after hotter US consumer prices on Wednesday revived the fear of another rate hike.
In the middle of it TSMC reported its sixth record quarter in a row: profit up 68.7% to NT$763.1 billion, ahead of estimates, with a gross margin of 66.4% and an operating margin of 58.7%. The company that makes almost every AI chip says demand is intact; the market is not listening yet.
In New York Barclays said it sees no wave of company AI spending and cut Dell, HPE and NetApp; Dell fell 11.3%. The Nasdaq-100 fund QQQ lost 2.0% to 728.95, CoreWeave 15.5% and Oracle 8.8%. On Thomas's chart QQQ now sits on a major support line. Against it: Anthropic told investors its third-quarter revenue rose to about $16.8 billion and it was profitable on an adjusted basis. Nasdaq futures are down about 1.0%; retail sales and producer prices come at 12:30 UTC.
- Nasdaq-100 — QQQ −2.0% to 728.95 and sitting on a major support line
- Korea — Kospi −8.5% to about 5,500, trading halted; SK Hynix −11%, Samsung −10%
- Tokyo and Taiwan — Nikkei −4.7%, Taiex −3.4%; China −2%, India +1.4%
- TSMC — record profit NT$763 billion, +68.7%, the sixth record quarter in a row
- TSMC margins — gross 66.4%, operating 58.7%; the newest 2nm chips 8% of sales
- Wall Street — hot inflation: S&P 500 −1.1%, Nasdaq −1.9%, chip fund −4.5%
- AI servers — Barclays sees no enterprise AI wave: Dell −11.3%, HPE −8.3%, NetApp −7.0%
- AI indices — Rubin −9.9% on the week, Agentic Winners +0.9%
- US data — retail sales and producer prices at 12:30 UTC
- Anthropic — revenue $16.8 billion in the third quarter, +45% on the quarter, and profitable on an adjusted basis
-
Nasdaq-100 — QQQ −2.0% to 728.95 and sitting on a major support line
StructureQQQ
- What
- The Nasdaq-100 fund QQQ fell 2.0% on Wednesday to 728.95, its third loss in a row and 4.0% below its record close of 759.66 on 6 October. On Thomas's chart it now sits on a major support line. Over the weekend Thomas wrote on LinkedIn that the AI trade, and the spending on AI hardware in particular, faced a rough two weeks. It took three sessions. The next levels below are the mid-September low of 704.54 (15 September), 3.4% lower, and the summer low of 661.73 (29 July), 9.2% lower.
- If
- QQQ closes back above Tuesday's 743.57 within the next few sessions
- Why
- this line usually holds; if it gives way, there is little in between until the September and summer lows
- Then
- the QQQ page carries the chart, the levels and the full read
-
Korea — Kospi −8.5% to about 5,500, trading halted; SK Hynix −11%, Samsung −10%
Context- What
- Seoul had its worst day of the autumn. The Kospi traded 8.5% lower at about 5,500 with an hour to go, and the exchange halted trading for 20 minutes at 12:38 local time after the fall passed 8%, as reported. SK Hynix sank about 11% to 1.26 million won and Samsung Electronics about 10% to 208,500 won during the session. It comes two days after Tuesday's 5.5% drop, when China's CXMT said it will launch denser server memory (DDR5) by year-end — no high-bandwidth memory (HBM) yet, and still two to three generations behind, analysts say, but with 10% of the DRAM market, up from 4% a year ago. Today's trigger was the US inflation number and Barclays' call on AI servers (point 7).
- If
- the Kospi closes off its low, and SK Hynix and Samsung recover part of the fall in tomorrow's session
- Why
- memory chips are the most crowded part of the AI hardware trade, and Korea is where it is sold first
- Then
- Rubin 100 holds SK Hynix and Samsung in its memory layer
- Token Split Pulse Chinese versus US model usage, measured in tokens — the demand side of the AI race, daily. See the split →
-
Tokyo and Taiwan — Nikkei −4.7%, Taiex −3.4%; China −2%, India +1.4%
Context- What
- The sell-off ran across the region. The Nikkei 225 fell 4.7% to about 64,550, with chip-testing maker Advantest among the biggest losers, as reported. Taiwan's Taiex dropped 3.4% to about 46,970 on the day TSMC reported. China's CSI 300 lost 2.1% and the Hang Seng 1.3%. The one market going the other way: India's Nifty 50 rose 1.4% to about 22,940. It holds almost no AI hardware.
- If
- Taiwan closes above its low after TSMC's numbers are digested
- Why
- Taiwan's market is dominated by TSMC; a beat that cannot lift it says the selling is about the whole chip group, not the company
- Then
- the AI board shows which index names are gaining and losing strength
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