On October 12, at an event in Singapore, Broadcom's CEO said something that stung. The next day, South Korean chip stocks fell sharply: SK hynix down 10.09% and the KOSPI down 5.46%.
Hock Tan's remark added to the pressure, with news from China's CXMT and heavy foreign selling piling on top of a market that was already sliding.
Let's go through it one piece at a time, from what he said to how everyone reacted.
What did Hock Tan actually say?
✦ This Week in Five Dates
October 9 to 14
Broadcom CEO Hock Tan made the remark during a panel discussion at a DBS event in Singapore. This is the original wording Reuters reported.
"A lot of investors have no clue what they're investing in, but set very extreme expectations, only to find out that it's almost like they are in a casino gambling."
He compared investors who set extreme expectations without knowing what they are buying to people gambling in a casino. Tan also compared wasteful use of AI to a kid who burns through $10 worth of arcade tokens in ten minutes and learns nothing.
He also said that raising capital could be the biggest constraint on Broadcom's AI growth.
Reactions were split
✦ Reactions to Tan's Remark
Two camps
Let's start with the voices that saw it differently. Nvidia's Jensen Huang has said the AI industry is still at an early stage. That is better read as a difference in outlook on AI growth than as a direct rebuttal of Tan.
Goldman Sachs' Rich Privorotsky said the remark was taken out of its context.
Some agreed. Wolf Richter defended the remark, saying the plain truth is that the business models of AI labs are uncertain.
The Financial Times saw it as raising doubts about whether AI infrastructure financed with debt can last. IG's Chris Beauchamp said that, with the CXMT news piled on top, margins across the semiconductor supply chain could come under pressure.
Bloomberg noted that the remark exposed worries about overheated AI investment. The Hong Kong Economic Journal, by contrast, said the remarks need not be read as pessimism about AI demand itself.
Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan expects AI demand not to slow much over the next two to three years. Hock Tan said demand for computing infrastructure could outrun supply until 2029–2030, though the wafer shortage should ease around 2028–2029.
DBS CEO Tan Su Shan said the market is repricing the risk of AI investment. The panel also pointed to rising borrowing costs and access to capital as constraints on further expansion.
How did Wall Street respond to Hock Tan's controversial 'casino' analogy? Watch Reuters' on-the-ground analysis of the market's divided reaction.
<Market Talk: AI casino label is 'too brutal'>
* This video is from Reuters' official channel. If you liked the video, give it a 'Like'!
💡 Tip: A 2-minute key video covering Wall Street's divided reactions to Hock Tan's 'casino' analogy, plus the AI semiconductor market's short-term correction.
Now that you've seen why reactions were split, let's look at the numbers: just how hard did Korea's market fall on October 13?
October 13: Korea's market rattled
✦ Samsung Electronics vs SK hynix
Rebased to 100 on Sep 4, KRX regular session
On October 13, the KOSPI closed at 6,035.35 (down 5.46%), Samsung Electronics at 232,000 won (down 7.39%), and SK hynix at 1,443,000 won (down 10.09%).
✦ October 13 Moves
Change from the previous trading day, KRX close
Foreign investors were heavy net sellers on the main KOSPI market, concentrated in Samsung Electronics and SK hynix, and a sell-side sidecar (a temporary halt to program trading) was triggered in the morning.
✦ KOSPI Closing Prices
Sep 29 to Oct 14, KRX regular session
On October 14 the KOSPI rebounded intraday but closed 0.44% lower at 6,008.81. ASML's third-quarter revenue came in slightly below expectations, but its full-year outlook was raised to €44–45 billion. Trading in the United States was mixed as well.
✦ Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX)
Sep 1 to Oct 13, US Eastern closing prices
On October 13, Micron fell 3.62% while Nvidia rose 0.97% and Broadcom gained 0.73%. The damage was concentrated in memory stocks.
Second headwind: China's 4F²
✦ 4F² DRAM at a Glance
What CXMT announced
On October 10, CXMT announced "key progress" on a next-generation 4F² DRAM. Compared with the existing 6F² structure, it can in theory cut the area of a memory cell by about one-third.
CXMT plans to unveil a server DDR5 RDIMM using the 4F² structure by the end of 2026.
By Counterpoint's revenue-based measure, CXMT's share was 10% in the second quarter of 2026, up from 4% a year earlier.
Musk's reply: "No crying in the casino"
On October 12, Musk replied on X to a @StockMKTNewz post that reported Tan's remark. "No crying in the casino." He did not mention Tan directly, but it reads as a reaction to the remark.
It parodies "There's no crying in baseball!" from the 1992 film A League of Their Own. The message: if you came in willing to take the risk, you have to take the losses too.
Musk, who keeps investing heavily in AI, has given Tan his own kind of answer.
An earlier crack, three days before
On October 9, Australia's Firmus withdrew its $5 billion IPO.
Its hoped-for valuation of $30.6 billion was triple the $10.5 billion of a private round two months earlier, and it was expected to carry about $30 billion of debt once its planned data centers were built.
Jun Bei Liu of TenCap called it an important reality check on the AI investment boom, but said it does not mean the end.
How global institutions see the AI bubble
✦ The AI Bubble Debate
Caution and optimism side by side
Some argue that valuation alone cannot prove a bubble. Goldman Sachs' Ben Snider noted that the S&P 500's forward P/E of 19 is close to its 10-year average and judged that near-term valuations show no clear sign of a bubble.
But he pointed out that whether the profit growth driven by AI investment will last is a separate question. UBS's Mark Haefele called AI a transformative technology, and Citi's Scott Chronert expects earnings to support equities through 2027.
Others say to stay alert. In BofA's October survey, 45% of respondents expected an AI bubble to appear in 2027, while 42% disagreed.
About 40% named AI capital spending as the most likely trigger of a system-wide credit crisis. JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon warned about high interest rates and fiscal deficits, and Deutsche Bank pointed to the risk of overbuilding.
Morgan Stanley took the middle ground.
It said surging bond issuance is risky, but the opportunity may extend beyond the companies building AI infrastructure to those that use AI to improve productivity and margins.
Forecasts differ by institution. One thing is shared: whether the money pouring in now can come back as real profit.
Views on the AI boom as a whole are split too. Ray Dalio called the AI surge a "classic bubble", while in Korea KB Securities' Kim Dong-won said Samsung Electronics and SK hynix may have set a second bottom within a W-shaped rebound.
There is an irony. The 107.4 trillion won forecast for Samsung's third-quarter operating profit would be a record for any quarter, yet the stock plunged. Even with a record forecast, is the market worried about whether those profits will last?
It used to be common sense that stocks rise when the economy is expected to improve and fall when it is expected to worsen. But with AI and semiconductors now leading the market, it has become the opposite, and investors seem very confused.
We almost have to hope the economy gets worse so that rates come down... What a strange situation. Right?
This isn't investment advice. You know that, right? Let's each protect our own hard-earned money.
Well then, shall we begin today's adventure?
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