Intel breaks news today with additional plans to help with an ongoing chip shortage in the microprocessor industry.
Reuters reports Intel plans a $20 billion investment in two Ohio plants that would create a combined 10,000 jobs, including the labor needed to build the plants.
Citing previous Intel efforts in Arizona, Martin Baccardax at The Street also offers the context of a $52 billion Biden funding plan for domestic chip development.
“(The bill) would help U.S. chipmakers expand domestic production levels and reduce their dependence on overseas markets for crucial components in the nation’s industrial and tech supply chain,” Baccardax writes.
But lest we think that the chip shortage is over, we have breaking updates showing that companies are still having a hard time sourcing microprocessors, including this news from Toyota:
“Toyota (has said it is) unlikely to meet its 2021-22 production target due to the chip shortage,” writes an unnamed analyst at TechXplore. “The world’s top-selling carmaker Toyota said Tuesday it no longer expects to meet its annual production target with operations hampered by the global chip crunch.”
“The chip shortage isn’t likely to resolve itself until well into 2022, and eventually, the group of people willing to pay a higher price may run dry,” adds Sean Szymkowski at Road/Show.
And then there’s the EV boom.
“The price of nickel, a critical component in the production of electric vehicle (EV) batteries, has hit a decade high,” writes Amit Mishra at Swarajya Jan. 20. “On the London Metal Exchange, the three-month nickel contract jumped as much as 4.4 per cent to $22,745 a tonne on 12 January 2022, the highest since August 2011. The rise reflects a broader boom in the commodity market due to falling stockpiles of critical metals and a production increase of EV’s from car manufacturers. With battery raw material prices soaring, the price sustainability of EV is under stress and has the potential to disrupt the transition to electric mobility which is a promising global strategy for decarbonising the transport sector. India is among a handful of countries that support the global EV30@30 campaign, which targets to have at least 30 per cent of new vehicle sales be electric by 2030.”
So if you have related holdings, form your own idea of what to expect with chips based on available data. And make moves accordingly.