South Korea, with 50 million people, is small in land and lacks resources, relying on the export of science and technology products, especially semiconductor products.
China has always been a big buyer of South Korean chips, and for many years, more than half of South Korea's chips have been sold to China, much to the envy of American counterparts.
On March 16, 2023, South Korea released chip data for January and February.
Data show that South Korea's chip inventory increased by 28% in January, and the overall inventory rate has been 265.7%. What does this mean? That is to say, the inventory has increased by nearly 3 times compared to normal turnover.
South Korea's chip industry struggled even worse in February, with exports falling 43.5 percent.
After chips cannot be sold to China, South Korean chips cannot be sold, at least China's market share has been lost. The importance of the semiconductor industry to South Korea is self-evident.
In fact, South Korea is not only facing the loss of the Chinese market, but also the problem of sluggish global consumption. South Korea itself has no ability to digest chips.
In the international market, the United States, Japan, and South Korea are the three strongest semiconductors, but they all rely on exports, especially South Korea. Chips have design, manufacturing and related industrial chains. South Korea has extensive upstream and downstream coverage.
Previously, China imported a large number of chips from the United States, a large number of memory chips from South Korea, and a large number of related raw materials from Japan. But with the trade friction, many imports have been cut off, and these chips can only be backlogged.
The production line does not mean to stop, it can reduce production and switch production, but it cannot be stopped, unless the business is abandoned.
In early March, China also released relevant data, in the first two months of 2023, China's chip imports reduced by 67.6 billion, a reduction of nearly one-third.
Originally, the purpose of the United States was to suppress China's high technology, but China even bought less low-end chips. Why is that?
Because China began to manufacture its own chips, it was solved by buying and buying before, although it saves trouble, but when it encounters special circumstances, it is stuck in the neck, so that China is painfully determined, and must solve the chips it makes.
Almost all we hear is SMIC. SMIC has four 12-inch wafer fabs under construction, and when the construction is completed, 70% of China's chips can be manufactured by itself.
SMIC's financial data shows that 3/4 of its revenue comes from the domestic market, and the remaining small part is also supplied to Southeast Asia and other countries.
South Korea's chip exports have fallen sharply, in fact, this part of the market has been filled by the mainland itself. These chips are sold to other countries, they do not have so much spending power, South Korea itself can not consume domestically, can only backlog.
Gates publicly stated:
Not selling chips to China will make them self-sufficient, the United States will not be able to prevent China from acquiring powerful chips, and the United States will lose many high-paying jobs.
We can't talk about 4, 5, 7nm, just mobile phones and other products in use, in fact, our daily life chips, do not need this level at all, more than 28 nanometers is enough, and this level, we can achieve it ourselves.
It can also be seen that American technology companies are laying off employees on a large scale, and chip giants have also laid off employees, which is all a reaction of the market.
Seeing the export data of South Korea's depression, the streets that were full of Chinese in previous years and now depressed, came to this step, didn't they choose themselves?