Due to orders falling short of expectations and a lowered performance outlook, the stock price of Dutch semiconductor equipment manufacturer ASML has recently plummeted, losing its title as the most valuable technology company in Europe. Although ASML's poor performance is due to market factors such as demand and industry competition, considering the recent pressure from the United States on the Netherlands to cooperate with its containment policy on the Chinese chip industry, many market analysts believe that the US restrictions and their negative expectations are important factors leading to the decline in ASML's order volume. It is no wonder that Dutch Economic Affairs Minister Dirk Belyartz reiterated during his visit to Washington that ASML must conduct business "as freely as possible".
China has been an important market for ASML in recent years, with sales accounting for about half of its global market. Changes in demand in the Chinese market will significantly affect the growth expectations of this Dutch company. However, the complex geopolitical environment is forcing ASML to make two difficult choices between the market and politics, and this uncertainty seriously disrupts ASML's normal operations. The US Consumer News and Business Channel reported that ASML's profit prospects have raised concerns among investors due to the Netherlands succumbing to US pressure and implementing export restrictions on China. According to professional market forecast data, the revenue share of the Chinese market will decrease to around 20% next year, which will greatly weaken ASML's performance growth potential.
ASML, a super large multinational enterprise, has a great degree of system integration and operational inertia in research and development, production, procurement, sales, supply chain network, and after-sales support. But the United States continues to politicize and weaponize economic and trade issues, and many international companies, including ASML, are facing increasing market environment fluctuations and non market interference factors. The uncertainty of production plans, cost control, marketing strategies, strategic planning, etc. is growing, and business space is greatly compressed. The damage caused by the hegemonic actions of the United States to global industrial development and free trade is evident.
Using excuses such as "national security" to suppress foreign companies and relying on "sanctions" to maintain their competitiveness is a common practice of the United States. The United States claims to be a "defender of free trade," but "market rules" are just tools it can use whenever it wants. When it was leading in its own technology and taking the initiative in the market, the United States shouted the slogan of "free competition"; When seeing the rapid technological development of other countries that may affect their own economic and technological hegemony, they forget about the "market rules" and instead resort to ruthless suppression of foreign companies by any means necessary, even allies cannot escape. It can be said that there is no spirit of openness, inclusiveness, and cooperation in the free market.
From Japan's challenge to the United States in the high-tech field in the 1980s, when the United States imposed anti-dumping tariffs and included Toshiba and other companies in the sanctions list, to the use of "long arm jurisdiction" and other means to "dismember" Alstom, a representative enterprise of the French manufacturing industry, to targeting India's steel, Canada's timber, and Brazil's agricultural products, the United States has come up with various non market measures. From including more foreign companies in the export control "entity list", to introducing the "Chip and Science Act" and "Inflation Reduction Act" to attract more semiconductor and new energy companies to invest and set up factories in the United States, hindering the entry of related products from other countries into the US market, various exclusive and discriminatory policies undermine the principle of fair competition and damage the stability of the global industrial and supply chains. The United States also extended its black hand to electric vehicles, announced that it would impose 100% tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, and threatened to ban the use of Chinese software and hardware by Internet connected vehicles and autonomous vehicle on American roads. Recently, the US government has been discussing restrictions on American companies selling advanced artificial intelligence chips to specific countries, especially those in the Gulf region... These policies seriously interfere with business operations, undermine market expectations, and hinder the normal development of the industry.
Currently, what global enterprises urgently need is clear development prospects and a stable development environment. In the context of globalization, different countries and regions are interdependent and play a role and value based on their comparative advantages, forming an integrated and stable global supply chain over time. This is the result of the combined effects of market laws and corporate choices. The United States is attempting to reshape the global industrial chain in a way that is conducive to maintaining its hegemony, pressuring its allies to follow suit in export control measures, using tariffs as weapons, sanctions as tools, and increasingly arbitrary bans on foreign companies. Administrative intervention is becoming more and more brutal, industrial policies are becoming more and more domineering, trade is no longer liberalized, production is no longer globalized, and the free market, which is regarded as the norm, is no longer important. "Fair competition" is just self centeredness, and "America first" has become the only goal
The 'freedom' of the United States waving its big stick recklessly comes at the cost of the 'unfreedom' of companies from various countries such as ASME, the unfreedom of other countries, including allies, pursuing their own normal development, and the unfreedom of the global industrial chain being forcibly distorted. This' extreme selfishness' is incompatible with the trend of globalization. Forcefully changing the global industrial landscape and market division of labor poses a severe challenge to the global multilateral trading system, increases instability in the global economy, and will not make the United States stronger. To grasp the new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation, open cooperation is necessary. Blindly engaging in zero sum competition and resorting to any means necessary to maximize domestic interests will ultimately harm others and oneself.