Nvidia, AMD, and Micron led a broad semiconductor selloff that dragged major indices lower through late June
The AI trade, which carried markets through much of the past two years, is having a rough week. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq are both on track for weekly losses, with the damage concentrated almost entirely in one sector: semiconductors.
The semiconductor selloff, by the numbers #
Nvidia closed down 4.2% at roughly $200 on June 25, landing it the dubious honor of worst performer in the PHLX Semiconductor Index year-to-date.
Earlier in June, Nvidia shed over $300 billion in market capitalization during a concentrated AI-chip selloff, a loss roughly equivalent to wiping out entire large-cap companies in a matter of days.
AMD did not escape the carnage either. Shares fell as much as 5.8% in a single session and dropped sharply from a mid-June high of $542.52 down to around $452.40.
Micron took some of the heaviest hits in the group, with shares declining between 9% and 11% over the same period. Broadcom and Intel also underperformed, confirming this was not a company-specific story but a sector-wide repricing.
Why the chip sector matters so much to the broader market #
The PHLX Semiconductor Index’s weakness over the week of June 23-26 acted as a drag on both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. This is the mechanical reality of how index construction works: a handful of large-cap names moving sharply downward pulls the whole index with them, regardless of how the remaining hundreds of stocks perform.
What this means for investors watching the AI trade #
The AMD move is particularly worth watching. A drop from $542.52 to around $452.40 over a matter of weeks is a significant technical shift, moving the stock well off highs that had been established during peak AI optimism in mid-June. Traders who entered positions at or near those highs are now sitting on substantial drawdowns, which creates selling pressure as stop-losses trigger and risk managers reduce exposure.
Micron’s 9% to 11% decline deserves separate attention. Memory chips are often treated as an economic bellwether because demand for memory is tied closely to actual build-out activity in data centers and consumer electronics. When memory stocks sell off this sharply, it can indicate that real-world demand is not keeping pace with the projections that were baked into elevated valuations.
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