NuAxiSemiconductor trade intelligence

NVIDIA May Cut TSMC Chip Orders Amid Mounting Pressure, Report Claims

What happened

According to a report from Taiwan's Commercial Times, NVIDIA may be slowing down its chip orders at TSMC, but the outlet cites unnamed supply chain sources and does not name a product, node, size, or timeline; neither NVIDIA nor TSMC has commented, and the claims are single-sourced for now. The report frames this as NVIDIA being squeezed from inside and out: internally, Jensen Huang's November 8 email to staff apologized for an extramarital affair, and the board's independent investigation is looking into reports that he was targeted by a foreign intelligence effort, though the board has said it has no reason to believe national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised. The outside pressure mostly comes down to export controls, including tighter export reviews and H200 chips reportedly stockpiled in Hong Kong, both of which the report says raise the risk of NVIDIA scaling back orders. It also cites foreign media reports suggesting some firms approved to handle H200 could be shell companies, feeding concerns that chips might reach China through fronts like these or middlemen in other countries; the report presents that as a suspicion rather than a finding. The report states that if cuts do happen, upstream suppliers such as TSMC and ASE are the most exposed.