TSMC smashes forecasts with record profit as it rides AI boom

TAIPEI: TSMC, the world’s main producer of advanced AI chips and a major supplier to Nvidia, on Thursday posted a 35% jump in fourth-quarter profit to record levels that blew past market forecasts and predicted more robust growth this year.

Riding high on the global boom in artificial intelligence, it said first-quarter revenue could surge as much as 40% from a year earlier to $35.8 billion, adding that it expected to increase capital spending in 2026 to as much as 37% to $56 billion.

Customers were “providing strong signals” and reaching out directly to request capacity, said TSMC, Asia’s most valuable listed company with a market capitalisation of around $1.4 trillion - more than twice that of South Korean rival Samsung Electronics.

Net profit for October-December climbed to T$505.7 billion ($16 billion), its seventh straight quarter of double-digit growth.

That was well ahead of a T$478.4 billion LSEG SmartEstimate drawn from 20 analysts. SmartEstimates are weighted toward forecasts from analysts who are more consistently accurate.

Trump’s trade policies and threats to put tariffs on semiconductors have created much uncertainty for the global chip industry, though that uncertainty has yet to seriously impair surging profits on the back of the AI boom.