TSMC Claims Some Companies are Sitting on Chip Inventories

[seth1911]

On the other hand Global Foundries with 12nm have really big Problems with its depts.

But yeah why produces Entry CPU and GPU in 12nm if u can use TSMC 7nm and push the Prices even higher and higher.

 

[AusWolf]

But what better way to help secure high prices right when the major Holidays are coming up?
1) Stock pile chips
2) Slow down manufacturing to help limit available inventory
3) Keep prices high or push higher due to limited availability
4) Ensure folks that more will be done to improve upon inventory
5) ????
6) Profit!

Do the question marks in 5. stand for "Blame covid for the artificially shortened supply, even though it really has nothing to do with it"?

 

[HammerOn1024]

Yeah, stockpiling makes almost no sense. The only quick idea i have would be some big players try to dry out the supply of their competitors, but that would be a real stunt.
And if such thing would become public after some of the targeted competitors went insolvent/bankrupt.
Oh that would be a story, something like "A cartel of big players of commertial sector XY killed 100 startups by stockpiling needed chips."

I hope someone shines right on it
cheers

Not necessarily. If it's to level out supply "in vs. out", where chip deliveries comming in are choppy, yet outflow needs to be consistent, then that's just good planning. If it's to jack up the price, that's bad.

 

[Metroid]

I said this many times, they are complacent to the bs, this article is just what I have been saying for at least 6 months, manipulation in order to keep prices high and like I said before is not only this case, many cases, they are using the pandemic as an excuse in order to rise prices of specific products and people are believing the bs and buying high because they fear if they dont buy now prices will rise even more, thieves and the media are taking control of supply and demand.

 

[R-T-B]

Do the question marks in 5. stand for "Blame covid for the artificially shortened supply, even though it really has nothing to do with it"?

God man, COVID has touched all supply chains, not just tech... How on earth could it NOT have something to do with it?

You can't even buy lumber at a normal price in Washington state.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

TSMC did the math but isnt saying anything so as not to aggravate the middle men.

TSMC produces and ships 10k chips for customer A according to the contract, the middleman decides to skim chips to hoard them, Customer A gets 6k chips and never questions TSMC about the shortage, TSMC doesnt realize, and just ships more chips to cover the "loss".

Thats one scenario. Another is that Customer A is fudging the shipping manifest, hiding the hoard of chips to say they dont have supply, and wait for the market to price to soar.

What I dont get is why there hasnt been a probe into this, it could be the the Micon, SK Hynix, Samsung crap all over again.

 

[Vayra86]

I think TSMC is the one who will be sad in 2025 and beyond. Lot of people are sick of buying a new phone every year (other than iphone sheep), etc. Market trends will change, and on top of that with 4+ new factories coming online by end of 2023, there is going to be a gluttony supply of chips for all industries. TSMC can laugh all they want. USA is getting 2-3 more new factories on its soil, and thats enough for national security reasons.

You forgot about cars... IoT... and pretty much half of everything we buy as well.

 

[Patriot]

You forgot about cars... IoT... and pretty much half of everything we buy as well.

Forgot seems a strong word... it implies knowledge being acquired.

 

[AusWolf]

God man, COVID has touched all supply chains, not just tech... How on earth could it NOT have something to do with it?

You can't even buy lumber at a normal price in Washington state.

Alright, maybe it has. But definitely not at the levels we're seeing.

 

[Space Lynx]

God man, COVID has touched all supply chains, not just tech... How on earth could it NOT have something to do with it?

You can't even buy lumber at a normal price in Washington state.

not to be political, but Trump raised tariffs quite high on lumber from Canada before covid was even a thing, it just took time for the prices to be felt.

 

[R-T-B]

not to be political, but Trump raised tariffs quite high on lumber from Canada before covid was even a thing, it just took time for the prices to be felt.

I could quote any number of sectors, lumber was just an example since Washington produces a ton of it.

 

[claes]

Alright, maybe it has. But definitely not at the levels we're seeing.

No it did:

PCs And Notebook Computers - The Unsung Heroes Of The Covid-19 Pandemic

At the first of this year, if any market researchers had forecasted growth in PCs and laptops in 2020, I would have suggested that they were off base.

www.forbes.com

285,000 PCs shipped in 2019 to 310,000,000 in 2020… It’s kind of hard to believe.

 

[AusWolf]

No it did:

PCs And Notebook Computers - The Unsung Heroes Of The Covid-19 Pandemic

At the first of this year, if any market researchers had forecasted growth in PCs and laptops in 2020, I would have suggested that they were off base.

www.forbes.com

285,000 PCs shipped in 2019 to 310,000,000 in 2020… It’s kind of hard to believe.

Like all those people working and studying from home didn't have PCs before the pandemic. Yeah, right...

 

[claes]

Like all those people working and studying from home didn't have PCs before the pandemic. Yeah, right...

I’m sure they did — well, probably not the youth. Don’t know why you wouldn’t believe actual sales numbers, profit margins, and stock price increases, but hey, enjoy your conspiracy

 

[AusWolf]

I’m sure they did — well, probably not the youth. Don’t know why you wouldn’t believe actual sales numbers, profit margins, and stock price increases, but hey, enjoy your conspiracy

Because there's no guarantee that they really are actual sales numbers, but it's a fact that companies and governments have lied to get what they want from us - making it plausible that they could do it again.

 

[AnarchoPrimitiv]

People do whatever they want with what they buy. I don't think stockpilling is the problem. The problem is why companies feel the need to stockpile. We need more companies producing chips, not just fabs, but more companies.

Yeah, they're stockpiling to drive up prices.... This is capitalism, remember, there's literally one, singular motivation for every behavior: profit.

 

[DemonicRyzen666]

It's a guess on my part, but it feels like a logical flow of things based on how things are currently going and when coupled with the up and coming Holidays it makes sense on a sick, twisted level.

Bottom line is, for these companies - make the investors happy. Make them happy by making more money. Make more money by taking advantage of the situation....every braking news story about a shortage or a pandemic or a natural disaster or a freak accident (like a fire or power outage or explosion) that could, maybe, even when the above mentioned issues don't relate to a company directly.


Breaking news! Metal prices are still on the rise!
Breaking news! The cost of tuna has gone up 150% due to high demand.

Can making company for canned tuna says....tuna prices are increasing! We need to slow down manufacturing of cans so we can increase the bottom line of our product! Cut production by 30%, blame it on the pandemic of worker shortage and higher prices for metal. Increase the cost of our products by 50%.

Granted, this is just a dumb, basic example - but I wouldn't put it past any company out there to make as much money as they can by utilizing all the shit floating around right now.


The wife's parents, they already did their Christmas shopping for the grandkids and finished up with it about a week ago because they understand the issues of technology being in short supply. Are they fools for getting their shopping done so early? Or are they smart and bypass all the other people that'll wait until Black Friday or closer to Christmas?

In your spoiler. I don't know if you know this, but the Price of tuna was being manipulated (A.k.a Price fixing) by all manufactures to profit higher than normal in agreement and all where fined in one big 3 billon dollars at one point Not to long ago.
After this prices returned to normal on Tuna.
This is not a good look for who ever is doing this, because if they can prove a single instant of price fixing their in for a world of hurt in fines.

 

[Mescalamba]

Almost any market can be manipulated if you have enough resources. Unsure if this is the case. At this moment its probably companies with some stockpile figuring out they have rare opportunity to x10 their profit.

 

[lexluthermiester]

It appears that some of the current chip shortages might be artificially induced by one or multiple companies in the chip supply chain

"What a shock!" said no one, ever.

suggesting that it might not actually be TSMC's customers that are the issue here, but rather middlemen and distributors that are hoarding chips and pushing up prices.

This is behaviour is as slimy as microsofts mentally retarded limitations and requirements.

while Liu also frowns upon the current US$50 billion budget that President Biden has allocated for new foundries in the US, considering that TSMC is investing twice as much on its own over the next three years.

On this one, Liu fails to understand that the US government has limited resources for such infrastructure stimulation, by law. It's part of the checks & balances aspect of US Federal legal code(and for those of you who wish to challange my statement here, no I'm not going to cite anything, go look it up for yourselves). On this point, he might as well complain to a brick wall.

 

[MentalAcetylide]

But what better way to help secure high prices right when the major Holidays are coming up?
1) Stock pile chips
2) Slow down manufacturing to help limit available inventory
3) Keep prices high or push higher due to limited availability
4) Ensure folks that more will be done to improve upon inventory
5) ????
6) Profit!

Sounds like a business model used by the Underpants Gnomes.

Anyway, it wouldn't surprise me if they were doing this "hoarding" by proxy. I'm quite sure there's no shortage of debauchery going on in the business world that we don't know about which greatly enriches some of these corporations at the expense of consumers; especially when you consider much of their advertising/marketing is based on manipulation.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

Almost any market can be manipulated if you have enough resources. Unsure if this is the case. At this moment its probably companies with some stockpile figuring out they have rare opportunity to x10 their profit.

I mean after watching memory manufacturers astroturf prices and artificial shortages 4 times int he last 10 years, Intel sandbagging consumer 6 core CPUs, nvidia sandbagging kepler capabilities, HDD manufacturers taking advantage of HDD shortages to push old inventory after that HGST factory flood, is it really a long stretch to say that the industry wouldnt be using this situation to create artificial scarcity? AMD and nvidia are driving massive profits despite "shortages" kneecapping sales. Someone is making serious cash somewhere.

 

[xorbe]

Middlemen looking to get slice of price gouging, news at 11. eBay resellers could not be reached for comment.

 

[lexluthermiester]

TSMC did the math but isnt saying anything so as not to aggravate the middle men.

I'm going to get a bit unpleasant here, but SCREW the middlemen! If they want to create massive problems the world over for nothing more than greed, they can get a boot up their twats!

 

[xorbe]

So basically at this point, we need DRM for supply chains.

 

[MentalAcetylide]

dont care usa ............. idi na chuuj i buy Huawei, Xiaomi,honor laptop,phone,headpones, home white tech, drone,cloud ,, and to my country comming first 100 chinese eletric cars,exclusive, )))

That's kind of a slanted opinion. Although electric cars could be a good thing for them(and other places such as India) if done right, given the population density they have to deal with & the air quality.