01. China, Too, Is Short of Auto Chips
Dec 24, Central News Agency – Nexperia’s ownership battle is now rippling through China’s automotive supply chain. The Ministry of Commerce confirms that Wingtech and the Dutch headquarters held a first-round negotiation last week and agreed to keep talking; Beijing urges The Hague to withdraw its administrative intervention so the global semiconductor chain can heal. With the Dutch side still withholding wafer shipments, Nexperia China has already locked in 2026 IGBT capacity from domestic foundries such as Dingtai Jiangxin and is fast-tracking qualification of 12-inch automotive-grade wafers. The crunch has forced Honda, GAC-Honda and Nio to cut output or delete features; Li Auto warns that by 2026 the industry-wide chip-fulfilment rate could fall below 50 %.
02. Copper at Record High, Cable Makers Post Price Hikes
Dec 26, Economic Daily – London copper closed at an all-time high for the third straight day, topping US$12,000/t, as AI servers and data-center builds turbo-charge industrial demand. The global refined-copper premium has jumped from <US$90/t in 2024 to US$350/t. China’s top cable producers—Walsin, Huarong and others—will lift 2026 list prices by ~10 %, saying they now need an extra 3 % above the copper price just to cover cost inflation. Output halts at Grasberg (Indonesia), Kamoa-Kakula (DRC) and Codelco (Chile) are widening the supply gap. Cable makers note that rising copper prices usually translate into inventory gains, higher revenue and fatter margins, and with AI infrastructure still in its build-out phase, the long-term outlook for copper remains bullish.
03. HBM Reshapes DRAM Landscape, SK hynix Keeps Overall Crown
Dec 23, Counterpoint – Global DRAM revenue surged q/q in Q3-2025 on explosive HBM demand. SK hynix stays No. 1 in total DRAM but loses a tick of share, while Samsung gains on HBM3E volume and overtakes Micron for second place in HBM itself. All three majors keep shifting wafers from commodity DRAM to high-bandwidth products, tightening supply and giving mature-node houses such as Nanya a breather. The widening split between advanced and legacy DRAM is expected to force a faster global memory-capacity build-out.
04. DDR4 Spot Price Doubles, Samsung Shelves Shutdown
Dec 25, SemiMedia – Samsung has postponed its scheduled DDR4 line closure. The 16 GB DDR4 module spot price has doubled this year to an all-time high, and the company has signed non-cancellable, non-returnable (NCNR) long-term deals that lock in profits through 2026. Extra output will go first to server and industrial customers; the PC/DIY channel will see little relief, and consumer-memory tightness is now expected to last into 2026.
05. Mature-Node Supply Tight, SMIC Lifts Partial Wafer Prices
Dec 23, SemiMedia – Robust demand for mature nodes, plus rising raw-material and energy costs, has pushed SMIC to raise 8-inch prices by about 10 %. Global IDMs continue to shutter mature lines in favor of advanced nodes, while server, automotive and AI applications keep mature capacity full. SMIC’s revenue and profit both grew through the first three quarters of 2025, with fabs running at high utilization. Industry watchers say AI is siphoning supply-chain resources, returning pricing power to mature-node foundries; SMIC’s move is seen as the first of several industry-wide corrections.
06. Cloud-ASIC Packaging/Test Demand Explodes
Dec 26, Economic Daily – Google, Meta and other hyperscalers are rushing out in-house ASICs, but TSMC’s CoWoS capacity is maxed out, forcing Meta et al. to hunt for back-end flexibility. PTI leverages deep memory-packaging expertise to break into advanced ASIC assembly and is believed to have captured Meta’s test/packaging sole-source award; subsidiary Giga Computing’s test lines are already full. Ardentec is also winning AI-ASIC test slots with tier-one customers, with meaningful revenue contribution set to start in 2026.