Shares in the Asia-Pacific markets tumbled sharply on the morning of July 28, with South Korea's KOSPI index extending its decline to 7%. SK hynix dropped more than 10%, while Samsung Electronics fell over 8%.
Internet celebrity FengGe shared the news on social media, stating he had already started trembling and questioned, "Can the A-share market hold up? It just saw a couple of sunny days. Please don't hurt me again." When asked by netizens about his current holdings, FengGe revealed he was invested in the semiconductor sector. A skeptical user challenged him, saying, "Didn't you say you wouldn't buy chips anymore?" FengGe somewhat aggrievedly replied that he had been consistently buying semiconductors all along.
Investors familiar with market sentiment are no strangers to FengGe. On social platforms, his every portfolio shift and bullish or bearish view consistently attracts a large crowd of stock investors, with many long-term observers jokingly labeling him a market "reverse indicator." He previously liquidated semiconductor positions and shifted to the consumer sector, only to see a rebound in the sector immediately after his exit. Upon returning to the tech track, he has repeatedly encountered intense sector volatility, creating a recurring pattern of mistimed trades.
When the market was hot, he would firmly back the prospects of semiconductor domestic substitution and the AI computing power supply chain; once external shocks emerged and the market weakened quickly, his panic was directly reflected in his public comments. It is precisely because of these stark contrasts from past trades that netizens seized on his old statement about "no longer buying chips" to raise doubts.
Setting aside the internet's meme-worthy labels, FengGe's current anxiety essentially mirrors the common dilemma faced by numerous semiconductor investors today. The structure of the South Korean stock market is highly unique, with storage giants Samsung Electronics and SK hynix holding a massive weight in the index, meaning their stock price movements directly dictate the broader market's direction.
This round of semiconductor sell-off in the Korean market was not triggered by a single piece of news but resulted from multiple factors converging: profit-taking by capital after the sector had accumulated massive gains previously, a market reassessment of long-term AI memory demand expectations, and divergent views on future capacity supply. In the short term, the emotional shock from sharp adjustments by overseas leaders is highly contagious, inevitably causing disturbances in the A-share semiconductor sector—particularly among memory supply chain stocks, where risk appetite is quick to cool in response to external fluctuations.
However, investors also need to distinguish between emotional shocks and changes in fundamentals. The price pullback by the Korean memory giants is more of a market rebalancing of valuations and trading positions, not a direct signal that the semiconductor industry cycle has definitively ended. The challenge remains that this sector possesses both tech-growth and cyclical attributes, making stock prices inherently volatile and highly susceptible to capital flows and global supply chain expectations, keeping short-term trading difficulty persistently high.