Key Facts
What the world’s markets decided. Two days after hitting records, the AI trade crashed. Chips were hammered — the US chip group SMH fell −7.01%, the Nasdaq 100 −3.29% and Nvidia −4.13% — while the fear gauge jumped +12.79% to 19.49. The old-economy Dow held flat (−0.09%) as money fled into safety.
Where the pain was deepest. Korea took the hardest blow of all. On Tuesday the KOSPI suffered its biggest points drop on record, a near-10% plunge that tripped an emergency circuit breaker, before staging a fragile rebound on Wednesday.
The one bright spot in Asia. Samsung led that rebound, jumping about 8% after announcing a 90-trillion-won (about $65 billion) share buyback and amid government talks to fast-track a new chip cluster. That lifted the KOSPI roughly +3.5% in early trade, even as Taiwan fell −1.79% and Japan −0.41%.
The clue in the wider scan. This was a broad de-risking, not just a chip story. Commodities slumped — copper −3.84%, silver −5.40%, gold −1.89% and oil −1.27% — and the dollar firmed, the classic signs of investors pulling back and worrying about growth.
