Asian tech stocks fall as Trump doubles down on tariffs, keeping investors on edge

Asian tech and chip-related stocks fell Tuesday after U.S. President Donald Trump made it clear that tariffs on Mexico and Canada would go into effect as planned.

Trump said the U.S. would impose 25% tariffs on goods imported from Canada and Mexico, adding that there was “no room left for Mexico or for Canada” to negotiate an alternative to the tariffs.

Trump also said he would impose an additional 10% tariff on imports from China, having already levied 10% duties that came into effect in February.

Asian tech stocks were also pressured by the near 9% fall in artificial intelligence darling Nvidia‘s shares overnight.

Japanese semiconductor equipment maker Advantest plunged as much as 9%, to its lowest level since last October, while Chipmaker Renesas Electronics lost 6.35%.

Tech investor SoftBank Group dropped 6.25%. The company’s CEO Masayoshi Son plans to borrow $16 billion to invest in artificial intelligence, according to a news report that came out over the weekend.

Over in South Korea, shares in SK Hynix lost as much as 3.26%, while Samsung Electronics bucked the trend to rise nearly 1% following the launch of its Galaxy A series smartphones with AI-powered features.

Chinese AI-linked stocks also fell with Alibaba and Kingsoft Cloud down as much as 2.23% and 8.46% respectively.

Meanwhile, shopping platform Meituan lost 0.62%, electronic vehicle maker BYD plunged 6.60%, Xpeng traded 1.97% lower and Li Auto lost 2.68%.

Chinese tech major Tencent‘s shares were trading 0.91% higher in Hong Kong.

In Taiwan, shares in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company lost more than 2% Tuesday, after Trump said the company would invest $100 billion in the U.S. to bolster chip manufacturing. The investment was a “tremendous move by the most powerful company in the world,” Trump said.