During the second quarter, chipmakers not named Nvidia saw remarkable gains, with Micron's stock rising over 240%, Intel's increasing by 216%, and AMD's nearly tripling. This surge resulted in a combined market cap increase of about $2 trillion for these companies, positioning them as the 10th, 11th, and 12th most valuable tech firms in the U.S.
Nvidia, while still the largest by market cap, only saw a 15% increase in its stock during the same period. The mixed performance of its hyperscaler customers—Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft—further highlights the shift in investor sentiment.
Barclays analyst Anshul Gupta noted that the market's rotation from AI hyperscalers to AI enablers has driven significant rallies in semiconductor stocks. Micron's revenue more than quadrupled due to rising memory prices, leading to a gross margin increase to 84.9%. Intel is also benefiting from renewed demand for CPUs and is investing in U.S. chip factories.
Other companies in the AI infrastructure supply chain, such as Marvell and Arm, also saw substantial stock price increases. The VanEck Semiconductor ETF recorded a 71% rise, marking its best quarterly performance since inception in 2000