ASML Stock: The Best Pick-and-Shovel Semiconductor Stock?

Final 12 months, we did a collection of articles to search out one of the best semiconductor shares not named Nvidia (NVDA). Our search led us to 5 fascinating semiconductors shares, although we didn’t really feel compelled to spend money on any of them, particularly since our Nanalyze Disruptive Tech Portfolio is already chubby in that class. That’s largely as a result of generative AI hype has propelled Nvidia into one of many handful of $1 trillion corporations by market cap. Talking of synthetic intelligence: We additionally checked out methods final 12 months to spend money on AI with semiconductor shares. Two corporations, Synopsis and Cadence, are among the many leaders that develop software program for designing chips. We favored the previous as an intriguing pick-and-shovel play on the semiconductor theme, whereas additionally scratching the AI itch as well.

But our paying subscribers need extra protection on semiconductor shares and have been urging us to cowl ASML (ASML), a Dutch firm that manufactures lithography machines, that are used to supply superior laptop chips at scale. A pick-and-shovel semiconductor inventory, ASML has been posting important income progress and stable gross margins – regardless of being a large {hardware} firm with a market cap of practically $280 billion. It’s a fancy enterprise that comes with some regulatory danger, significantly due to a U.S. export ban on sure chip applied sciences to China (extra on that later). However as one subscriber informed us (by quoting us on gold-standard inv