TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — TSMC is projecting record earnings this year, banking on strong AI chip demand to offset the drag from US tariffs and a surging Taiwan dollar, Nikkei Asia reported Tuesday.
Following the company’s annual general meeting Tuesday, TSMC Chair and CEO C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said that revenue is forecast to grow by a mid-20% range, driven by persistent demand-supply imbalance in AI chips. “I’m not afraid of anything – only of a global economic slowdown,” Wei said, adding that the company is already receiving chip orders for humanoid robots.
Wei acknowledged that US tariffs are indirectly impacting TSMC. “Importers pay the tariffs, but higher prices can depress demand,” he said. Nevertheless, he emphasized AI remains a powerful growth engine and revealed that the focus of his recent discussions with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) has been on expanding capacity to meet rising orders.
However, Wei warned that foreign exchange volatility poses a larger threat. A recent 8% appreciation in the New Taiwan dollar could shave over 3 percentage points from gross margins, translating to billions in lost profit based on TSMC’s NT$3 trillion (US$100 billion) revenue base. “Every 1% rise in the NT dollar cuts operating margin by 0.4 percentage points,” he said.
To mitigate those losses, Wei suggested that price adjustments may be on the horizon. “We will continue to deliver world-leading technology at fair value,” he said, without confirming whether TSMC would raise chip prices this year.
On global compliance, Wei said TSMC is working to uphold US export controls and vet not just clients but also downstream buyers. “We look at our clients’ clients’ clients to ensure there are no violations,” he said, adding that TSMC will continue cooperating with multiple governments to enforce rules.
As for expansion plans, Wei said chipmaking ecosystems cannot be built overnight and that outside of the US, Taiwan, China, Europe, and Japan, no other regions – including the Middle East – have yet developed viable chip clusters. “It’s almost impossible to build that in a short time,” he said.
