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Donald Trump’s newly announced tariff regime — the harshest seen in the US in a century — is sending shockwaves through the global tech industry, with American giants like Apple and Nvidia bearing the brunt.
The Nasdaq 100 Index, home to the world’s biggest tech firms, has plunged 16% in the past six weeks. On Thursday alone, US$1.4 trillion in market value was wiped out, marking the sector’s worst day since 2020. Chipmakers and hardware-focused companies were hit hardest, as the tariffs target core manufacturing hubs in China, Taiwan, Vietnam, and India — the heart of global tech supply chains.
Trump’s plan slaps China and Taiwan with tariffs of 54% and 32%, respectively, while Vietnam and India — rising stars in electronics assembly — face levies of at least 26%. These are devastating figures for companies like Apple, Broadcom, and Nvidia, which rely on Asian supply chains for both components and labour.
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“This is really a worst-case scenario for tech,” said Paul Stanley, CIO at Granite Bay Wealth Management. “We haven’t seen the end of the selling.”
Apple shares dropped 9.3%. Thursday, its biggest single-day loss since March 2020, erasing more than $310 billion in market value. Chip stocks followed suit: Micron and Microchip Technology each fell over 16%, Broadcom declined 11%, and Nvidia lost 7.8%. Amazon, heavily reliant on imported goods for its e-commerce empire, tumbled 9%.
Software firms like Microsoft and Workday, with less direct exposure to hardware tariffs, fared better, posting smaller losses.
Tech’s global supply chains, perfected over decades, can’t be reshaped overnight. Relocating production to the US would be a massive and costly undertaking. Analyst Dan Ives of Wedbush estimates it would take Apple $30 billion and three years to move just 10% of its operations from Asia to the US — a move he calls a “non-starter”.
“The price of iPhones would skyrocket,” Ives warned, echoing Wall Street’s growing scepticism over the feasibility of Trump’s manufacturing vision.
Despite the carnage, not all investors are panicking. Jason Britton, CIO at Reflection Asset Management, sees opportunity amid the volatility.
“There are significant pockets of opportunity being created,” he said. “If your investment horizon is longer than 12 months, for companies that were strong businesses yesterday, you should be buying them today.”
Still, with AI infrastructure spending expected to slow and fears of recession growing, many traders are rotating out of tech and into more defensive sectors — leaving big tech on shaky ground for the foreseeable future.
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