The Morning 10
Asian Chips — Korea’s chip exports more than tripled and the Kospi touched 7,000, with Tokyo shut
- 1 Korea’s 1–20 September customs print: total exports $71.4bn, +78.3% year on year and a record for any twenty-day tally (previous $61.7bn, June); semiconductors $34.12bn, +259.4%, 47.8% of all exports and an all-time high share; imports $48.4bn, +26.7%; trade surplus $23.0bn; petroleum products +47.8%, ships +63%, cars +9.3%
- 2 Asia’s chip tape runs on a rotating skeleton crew this week: Tokyo closed Monday (Respect for the Aged), Tuesday (bridge holiday) and Wednesday (autumn equinox), reopening Thursday 24th; Seoul open Monday to Wednesday then closed Thursday and Friday for Chuseok, back on the 28th; Taipei open Monday to Thursday, closed Friday for the Mid-Autumn Festival; Hong Kong open throughout
- 3 Friday’s US closes and the lines: S&P 500 ETF $761.69, −0.1% but a second close above $757.83; Nasdaq-100 fund $721.45, +0.6%, above $708.69 and clear of the 704 shelf; semiconductor ETF $533.07, +2.7%, above $505 and through the fifty-day at $525.67; memory ETF $59.61, +3.2%, above the $58 owed since Monday; Magnificent Seven fund $70.46, −0.5% but above 69.5; equal-weight S&P −0.5%, Russell 2000 −0.5%, software fund −1.4%
- 4 The equipment three rose hard on Friday and still lost the week: Applied Materials $444.57, +6.5% on the day and −2.6% over five sessions; Lam Research $288.11, +7.0% and −3.4%; KLA $176.99, +4.7% and −2.0%. SanDisk $1,791.82, +11.0% on the day and +9.7% on the week; Micron $1,015.80, +3.9% and +4.2%, its first close above $1,000 since 9 September; Nvidia $222.27, +1.3%; Broadcom $357.61, +3.0%; ASML $1,679.92, +3.1%
- 5 Rubin Build-Out EW closed Friday at 1,954.97, +2.6% on the day but −0.4% on the week and −0.4% on the month; by layer, Design +2.5% on the day and +3.3% on the week — the only layer positive over five sessions — against Fabrication +2.8% and −0.3%, Assembly & Test +3.7% and −0.4%, Infrastructure +2.4% and −1.5%
- 6 HALO Growth 100 EW 1,005.28 Friday, −0.7% on the day, −1.5% on the week and −7.6% on the month; Agentic Ecosystem EW 1,633.12, −0.8% on the day but +6.6% on the week and +5.8% on the month; AW40 EW 909.94, −1.5% on the day, flat on the week, −2.2% on the month
- 7 Oil sold into an attack: Brent $97.98 at 05:55 UTC, −1.3% from Friday’s $99.29 and back under $100 after the $108 spike; WTI $94.46, −1.7%; a Houthi ballistic missile aimed at Riyadh on Saturday was intercepted by the Saudi-led coalition, with a fire at a fuel depot near King Khalid International Airport and further attempts reported at Bisha, Taif, Farasan and Yanbu
- 8 Rates, the dollar, the yen and gold at 05:55 UTC: 10-year 4.998%, back at 5.00% after Friday’s 4.947%; VIX 14.81 against Friday’s 15.44; dollar index 100.34, +0.1%; yen 157.04 to the dollar, three days after the Bank of Japan hiked to 1.25%; euro $1.1477; gold futures $4,389.60, −0.8%, with the gold ETF’s Friday close of $401.17 still under its two-hundred-day at $416.22; bitcoin $81,534, +1.3%
- 9 Washington, Thursday 24 September: Donald Trump meets Xi Jinping at the White House. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Vice Premier He Lifeng opened preparatory talks in New York on Sunday and Bessent called the meeting successful; the agenda reported by Reuters, Bloomberg and CNBC covers trade and investment, artificial intelligence, the Iran war, rare-earth and critical-mineral flows, tariff cuts, and whether the trade truce that expires on 10 November is extended
- 10 The clock: Seoul and Taipei trade today, Tokyo does not; Cintas reports Wednesday, BlackBerry and Costco Thursday; the Trump–Xi summit Thursday; Tokyo reopens Thursday as Seoul leaves for Chuseok; Taipei closed Friday; Micron reports 30 September; the lines — S&P ETF $757.83, Nasdaq-100 fund $708.69 and 704, chip ETF $505 and the fifty-day $525.67, memory ETF $58, Magnificent Seven fund 69.5, the 10-year 5.00%, the yen 156 and 160, Brent $100, bitcoin $82,139 and $76,838