Asian technology exporters entered 2026 with a strong hand. The region’s semiconductor manufacturers, server assemblers, and data-center equipment suppliers had powered a 40% jump in AI-related trade between 2024 and 2025, the most consequential growth story in global goods markets.
Then oil prices rose sharply against the backdrop of Middle East conflict, and the question for investors shifted from whether the AI buildout would continue to how much energy costs would constrain it, and where that left valuations.
The World Trade Organization had flagged the risk earlier in the year. Chief economist Robert Staiger said in March that if elevated oil prices persist through 2026, they could put a ‘crimp’ on the AI boom, given how energy-intensive data centers and chip manufacturing have become. In the first three quarters of 2025, 70% of all investment growth in North America was accounted for by AI-related goods, the WTO calculated. An energy shock severe enough to slow that investment rate would be felt quickly across Asia’s supply hubs.
“The AI buildout is the most capital-intensive investment cycle we have seen in a generation, and energy costs are now a material input to every decision about where and when to build,” said Al Christy Jr., founder and CEO of equities-based financing firm EquitiesFirst. “When you have elevated energy prices running alongside this level of infrastructure commitment, you get real dislocations in valuations. Those dislocations can provide opportunities for patient capital.”
Hardware That Can’t Be Easily Replaced
Semiconductor and data-center equipment shipments grew 40% in value between 2024 and 2025, with AI-linked exports accounting for roughly one-third of all worldwide goods trade growth over the same period.
Taiwan, South Korea, and parts of Southeast Asia supplied the bulk of that growth to markets around the world. Chipmakers represent approximately 40% of Korea’s Kospi index, a composition that reflects how thoroughly AI hardware demand has reorganized equity valuations across the region.
The inference era now taking shape deepens Asia’s structural position further. The first phase of the AI buildout ran on GPU-intensive training workloads. The next phase, in which agentic AI applications run continuous, task-based inference at scale, draws heavily on the general-purpose processors and advanced server infrastructure where Asia’s manufacturers hold the deepest expertise.
Industry analysis projects that inference will account for more than half of all AI compute globally by 2030, representing roughly 30 to 40% of total data-center demand. High-volume CPU production, advanced packaging, and fast-cycle supply chains built over decades do not transfer quickly to new geographies.
Capital Deployment at the Inflection
For investors holding significant equity stakes in Asia’s hardware manufacturers, the current combination of compressed valuations and an intact long-term demand thesis creates a specific capital deployment question.
Equity-backed financing, in which investors access liquidity secured against existing stock holdings rather than selling them, has gained traction as a tool for navigating exactly this kind of pressure.
EquitiesFirst, which specializes in securities-backed financing against equity portfolios, works with institutional holders and founders weighing that decision.
Christy Jr. sees the current period as a recalibration more than a reversal. “Semiconductor capacity in East Asia and the ability to scale it are not going to relocate because of an energy shock,” he said. “What moves is sentiment, and that creates opportunities for investors who have done the work on where the supply chain actually sits. The question is how to stay positioned without carrying the full exposure to valuation swings. Equities-backed capital is one answer to that question.”
EquitiesFirst’s financing reflects a recognizable pattern: investors who built positions during the AI buildout are reluctant to exit core holdings even as valuations pulled back, and securities-based financing provides a mechanism to access capital against those positions rather than liquidating them at a suboptimal moment.
The energy shock has introduced real uncertainty, and the WTO’s warning about AI investment and prolonged oil prices is well-founded. But the capital publicly committed to the buildout, across sovereign budgets, hyperscaler investment plans, and corporate infrastructure programs, is not easily redirected.
The underlying bet, that Asia’s role as the world’s AI hardware supplier is durable, has decades of supply chain history behind it.