The world's biggest contract chipmaker said its second-quarter haul was a 38.6 per cent jump from what it made during the same period last year. That’s a tidy leap, especially when everyone thought it would scrape in somewhere between $28.4 billion-$29.2 billion. 

TSMC has done well on the back of the AI boom, thanks to it being the silicon creator for Nvidia and the rest of the GPU-hungry mob stampeding into large language models and AI inferencing.

The company will dump its full Q2 earnings on 17 July, including the usual dry PowerPoint slides, a peek at Q3, and whatever crystal ball work its execs can muster for the rest of the year. Punters will be watching for any clues as to whether the AI gravy train will keep rolling or start running out of steam.

In the background, TSMC is busy expanding its foundry empire, including a new fab in Germany and university partnerships in Japan to keep the leading-edge nodes coming. It’s  dealing with currency whiplash by floating $10 billion in shares to protect against forex surprises.

It helps that the company controls the 3 nm node market with an iron grip, keeping rivals like Samsung and Intel at arm’s length, at least for now. 

All eyes now turn to the next earnings dump. If Q3 guidance keeps the champagne flowing in Taipei, the cocaine nose jobs of Wall Street are going to be lighting cigars with memory wafers.