US inflation at 3.7% sparks Asian sell-off in AI and chip stocks

On October 15, 2026, Asian markets recorded one of their heaviest sessions in recent years. It all came after the release of September US inflation data. South Korea’s Kospi closed at 5,532.74 points, down 7.9%. Seoul halted trading for twenty minutes as losses piled up. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 fell 5%.

The number that triggered it all came on Wednesday. Consumer prices in the United States rose 3.7% year-on-year in September. The figure was up from August’s 3.4% and exceeded the 3.6% forecast. Core inflation, which excludes food and energy, also came in higher than expected. Kyle Rodda of Capital.com put it bluntly: “US inflation is sticky.” That keeps alive the chance of another interest rate hike by the Federal Reserve. The data come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which tracks the consumer price index.

Chip Giants Pay the Price of Expensive Money

The selling started in New York. On Wednesday the S&P 500 lost 1.1% and the Nasdaq 1.9%. Nvidia closed down 3.2%, Broadcom 3.1% and AMD 5.7%. Then the wave swept across Asia. The heavyweight memory and semiconductor equipment makers collapsed. Samsung Electronics closed down 11.4%, SK Hynix 12% and SoftBank Group 9.4%. In Japan, Kioxia lost 13.1% and Tokyo Electron 7.8%.

The paradox came from Taiwan: TSMC posted profits above expectations and said that AI demand remains “very strong”. The markets fell anyway. The reason is that investors are no longer asking whether demand exists. They are asking what that demand is worth when money costs more. The ten-year Treasury yield hit 5.35% at the start of the month. It is the highest since 2002. On Thursday it was still at 5.11%. With yields at these levels, shareholders pay less today for profits promised years from now. AI companies are priced almost entirely on those future profits.

South Korea paid more because of concentration. The Kospi crossed 9,000 points in June. It is now down more than 16% in a month. Foreign investors sold $1.8 billion of Korean shares on Thursday morning alone, and more than $10 billion since early October.

The Debt Behind the AI Boom

The second concern is how the boom was financed. Hebe Chen, of Vantage Global Prime, linked the sell-off to the funding strains at CoreWeave, the AI-focused cloud provider. Much of the construction of AI infrastructure has been paid for with debt, and the cost of that debt is rising along with rates.

Lorraine Tan of Morningstar pointed to “a possible mismatch between market’s growth expectations for the tech sector and what may eventuate” as the central issue.

The International Monetary Fund also weighed in on Thursday with a dedicated report. It warned that a correction in AI investments or valuations would hit Asia disproportionately. The worst days may not be over.

Silver Fell Ahead of the Same US Inflation Figure

The cost of money is compressing precious metals too. On October 13, silver closed at about $59.12 an ounce, down 1.88% after the previous session’s -0.95%. European Business Magazine’s analysis noted a curious fact. The dollar and Treasury yields weakened, moves that normally support the metal. Silver fell anyway. Supply supports prices: the Silver Institute forecasts a market deficit of 46.3 million ounces in 2026. But industrial demand is expected to fall 3%, mainly due to lower silver use in solar panels.

Before the release, the same analysis noted that a 0.2% monthly rise in core inflation would have left the Fed room to keep rates on hold in October, while markets still saw a strong probability of a hike in December. Until the Federal Reserve signals it has finished tightening monetary policy, the silver deficit will remain a long-term theme with no short-term force.

Why It Also Hits European Funds and Startups

For the Italian and European innovation ecosystem, the lesson is twofold. The first concerns balance sheets: the continent’s pension funds and technology portfolios invest in the same companies building memory, optics and chips. When component makers lose 10% in a single day, the correction soon reaches Amsterdam and Munich too. European Central Bank economists had already warned in August that the boom was heading toward a correction.

The second concerns corporate financing. The price of money, not the technology, decides the pace of the cycle. Until US inflation comes back down, every hot print will hit the world’s most crowded trade first, and today that is artificial intelligence.

Sources:

• New EU Strikes Deal to Shield Hybrid Carmakers from Chinese Imports | europeanbusinessmagazine.com
• Silver Falls 2.8% to $59 Ahead of US CPI Report | europeanbusinessmagazine.com
• Asia’s Chip Giants Tumble as the AI Trade Collides With Sticky US… | europeanbusinessmagazine.com