Intel Corp (INTC)

[Unkwn]

This is not a car forum, but ...

Here is warning from Hyundai Motors about China that you stated has seen more cars sold in that country

Statista tells me that almost 2.5 million cars have been sold last month in China. That is up from around 2 million in december a year ago. Last december has also been the strongest month in car sales for the last 12 months. Sure, it is units, not sales, so I don't know about that, but I know Hyundai doesn't represent the global car market.

Less growth in China these days still means much higher growth in absolute terms, considering China's economy has grown a lot in the past decades. This is also something to consider. It certainly won't last forever. Not for the US, not for China, not for anyone (remember Greece, Rome ...).

As mentioned, there is still India, about to outpace China in terms of growth. That's a huge market and still a huge gap between the two countries. I'd call it a huge potential - and threat for our western workforce at the same time.

Coming back to TSMC and its growth: As I mentioned already, it's not revenue what pays for CAPEX, neither is it net income but it is cash flow. If I recall correctly, TSMC had about 12 billion of operating cash flow last year and Intel had 20 billion. That's a big difference in spending power. If TSMC want's to keep its roadmap, they'll have to spend more than 10 billion a year (as comparison: Samsung spent 15 last year), which basically would mean all of their cash flow. That is without competition taking market share in foundry and no slowdown in smartphone sales - very optimistic. This would also mean that TSMC would have to suspend its dividend or/and increase its debt level. Intel is in a much more comfortable position regarding financials (though they stagnate for quite a while which also is worrying).

I expect the shrinking race to slow down significantly in the coming years. This gets increasingly difficult and expensive to do. What are the real benefits from shrinking further? Performance and power don't improve much with each node and ultra high CAPEX and more processing steps equalize the lower consumption of wafers. It starts to not make much sense anymore, economically speaking. In addition, it is a consolidated industry, just 4 significant players left in the game, maybe 7 if you count in relevant memory players. Doesn't make much sense to enter a spending war when the benefits of it are so low.

The industry needs to move away from shrinking nodes to other ways of improving density. Could be 3D or some new materials. As long as this doesn't happen, I see a slowdown for everyone, no matter what roadmaps TSMC pumps out.