Asian tech stocks drop with SK Hynix plunging 10% after Wall Street AI names fall

SK Hynix Inc. 12-layer HBM4E memory chips on a LPDDR5X CAMM2 memory module arranged at the company's office in Seongnam, South Korea, on Friday, July 24, 2026. SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics Co. are set to test investor appetite for memory chips as South Korea's stock market now a bellwether for global AI sentiment grapples with violent swings driven by leveraged chip bets. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesBloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty ImagesAsian technology stocks fell Thursday, tracking U.S. peers that pulled back in overnight trading, underscoring the heightened volatility in tech names globally.In Japan, SoftBank Group dropped 4.36%, while chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron was over 5% lower. Advantest lost 2.14%, and Japanese memory chipmaker Kioxia declined 8.84%.In South Korea, SK Hynix fell 9.71% and Samsung Electronics declined 6.13%. Seoul Semiconductor dropped 4.27%.Taiwan's TSMC, the world's largest contract chip manufacturer, was 1.46% lower.Tech stocks have been seeing heightened volatility in recent sessions, with South Korea's semiconductor-heavy market whipsawing between steep losses and record gains.Despite the heightened volatility analyst...