HONG KONG (AP) — Shares slumped Thursday in Japan and South Korea in the latest spate of heavy selling of computer chip stocks, while U.S. futures edged lower after modest losses on Wall Street.Oil prices fell after negotiators from the U.S. and Iran met separately with mediators from Qatar and Pakistan on Wednesday, as traders eyed developments in achieving a permanent end to the war in Iran.South Korea’s benchmark Kospi index sank 7.9% to 7,648.09. with chip-related shares trading lower. Memory chipmaker SK Hynix lost 14.6% and Samsung Electronics tumbled 9.1%.Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 lost 2.5% to 68,733.15. Shares of chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron shed 7.4%.Taiwan’s Taiex declined 0.6% as chipmaking giant TSMC, or Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., fell 1.6%.Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was up 0.7% to 23,034.34. Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD’s shares rose 7.9% after it reported its sales rose for a second straight month. The Shanghai Composite index fell 1.6% to 4,046.76.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 edged less than 0.1% higher to 8,724.50.India’s Sensex climbed 0.5%.Surging demand for artificial intelligence has pushed many AI and tech stocks higher in recent months, with markets in South Korea, Japan and Taiwan reaping big gains. So far this year, the Kospi and Nikkei 225 have gained about 77% and 33%, respectively.
