Nvidia leads chips higher amid new low cost GPU; AMD also gains
Andrei Berezovskii
Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) was among the biggest gainers in the semiconductor industry on Thursday after the Jensen Huang-led company announced details for its new low-priced GPUs.
Nvidia (NVDA) officially announced its GeForce RTX 4060 family of GPUs, including the RTX 4060 Ti 8GB, which is slated to go on sale on May 24 at $399, while the larger GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 16GB will go on sale in July for $499.
The cheapest card in the family, the RTX 4060, will also be available in July at $299, the company said. 
Nvidia added nearly 5%, while AMD (NASDAQ:AMD), which also competes with Nvidia (NVDA) in the GPU space, rose around 3.5% in mid-day trading.
Intel (NASDAQ:INTC), which competes with both Nvidia and AMD, rose around 2.6% one day after it held a conference call to discuss its plans to take on Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) in the foundry business.
Led by CEO Pat Gelsinger, Intel (INTC) has bet its future on its IDM 2.0 strategy, which includes becoming a semiconductor foundry and building chips for companies other than itself.
Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM), the world's largest foundry, rose more than 2.5% after executives from the company and other chip makers met with Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to deepen cooperation for the semiconductor supply chain.
"We are impressed by the initiative the Japanese government is taking to strengthen the global semiconductor ecosystem," Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) Chairman Mark Liu said after meeting Kishida, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Earlier this year, it was reported that Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) was in talks to build a second plant in Japan.
Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) is already building a wafer fab plant in Kumamoto, Japan, with the multi-billion dollar plant having been announced in November 2021.
Prime Minister Kishida also met with executives from Intel (INTC), Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU), Samsung (OTCPK:SSNLF) and others.
Micron (MU) shares rose nearly 5% after the company announced it would invest $3.7B in Japan for new chips, using extreme ultraviolet technology.
Wolfspeed (WOLF) rose nearly 2% as investment firm Jefferies started coverage on the semiconductor company with a hold rating.
Analyst Natalia Winkler said she likes Wolfspeed's (WOLF) position in the silicon carbide market and the opportunity to become a "fully integrated device player," but with rising interest rates and recession concerns, she added it's unlikely investors will give the North Carolina-based Wolfspeed a premium valuation.
Rambus (RMBS) shares rose nearly 9% after Jefferies upgraded the stock on "increased confidence" in its ability to take market share.
Other semiconductor stocks were largely higher on Thursday, including gains of 1.5% or more for Qualcomm (QCOM), Texas Instruments (TXN), Analog Devices (ADI) and NXP Semiconductors (NXPI).
Also seeing strong gains were Qorvo (QRVO), Monolithic Power Systems (MPWR) and Skyworks Solutions (SWKS).
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