US Stock Market Move | Semiconductor equipment and materials sector surged, Texas Instruments Incorporated (TXN.US) rose nearly 7%

On Wednesday, the semiconductor equipment and materials sector rose across the board, with Texas Instruments Incorporated (TXN.US) up nearly 7%, ASML Holding NV ADR (ASML.US) and Lam Research Corporation (LRCX.US) up over 4%, and Applied Materials (AMAT.US) up 4%. The management of Texas Instruments Incorporated stated in a declaration on Tuesday that they expect the total revenue range for the first quarter to be between $4.32 billion and $4.68 billion. The midpoint of this performance outlook range is slightly higher than the average estimate of $4.42 billion by Wall Street analysts. Texas Instruments Incorporated expects earnings for this period to reach a high of $1.48 per share (i.e., the first quarter earnings outlook range is between $1.22 and $1.48 per share), while analysts' average expectation is around $1.26 per share. Clearly, the midpoint of the range significantly exceeds market expectations. The latest optimistic outlook range from Texas Instruments Incorporated indicates that major customers have fully absorbed the accumulated inventory of analog chips during the COVID-19 pandemic and have started ordering in bulk again with the core DRIVE primarily coming from AI data center analog chip business orders. Haviv Ilan, the CEO of Texas Instruments Incorporated, stated in a performance conference call with analysts that fourth-quarter orders increased significantly, with particularly strong growth in orders from AI data centers. "The market has been very tight, we just need to see how the results turn out." Ilan said that the data center business division of Texas Instruments Incorporated achieved a revenue growth of 70% in the fourth quarter ending in December.