28 January 2025 – A Chinese start-up shakes up the tech industry – but is there really that much to the story or was it just a hoax in the end? Italian association takes a stand against EU Safeguard measure.
Chinese start-up shakes up stock markets – with a duck?
The Chinese start-up DeepSeek AI shook up the stock markets yesterday. In particular, share prices of large tech companies, such as Nvidia, but also US electricity manufacturers fell significantly in some cases. According to media reports, Nvidia alone lost up to USD 600 billion in stock market value.
The Chinese DeepSeek AI is currently being praised to the skies, as it allegedly produces similar or better results than ChatGPT and comparable AI models with significantly fewer and older Nvidia chips and should therefore also consume less energy.
Chineses DeepSeek breakthrough just a duck?
However, there are already increasing doubts as to whether the Chinese start-up’s claims regarding the number of chips used are even correct. As there are extensive export restrictions on US high-performance chips to China, DeepSeek AI could have been trained with significantly more computing capacity than the start-up is currently willing to admit – otherwise it could face sanctions from the US government. There are also voices suggesting that investors have been looking for an excuse to get out of Nvidia shares.
Press releases a popular investment instrument
In the recent past, it has been possible to observe how supposedly market-shaking reports – e.g. about Nickel Matte or Green Steel – have influenced public and economic opinion and moved share prices in one direction or another.
There are also very recent examples of this, such as the current review of the EU Safeguard measures against certain steel products or the Carbon Border Tax CBAM. While EU steel makers are trying to set off one smokescreen after another and prefer to trade in CO2 certificates instead of producing steel, they are importing millions of tons of input material in the form of steel slabs from NON-EU-countries.
So you should always be careful with reports that seem too good or too terrible and not believe everything you are told.
Italian association takes a stand against Safeguard measure
The Italian association Assofermet, which represents traders in scrap, raw materials and steel, has spoken out against stricter EU safeguard measures for steel imports and is calling on the European Commission not to extend them beyond 2025. The association emphasizes that restricting imports is not a solution to the persistently weak demand in the steel processing sectors. Instead, the association calls for a broad-based economic policy to boost demand and steel consumption and emphasizes that trade defense measures are not the solution to overcome the challenges facing the industry.
We welcome Assofermet’s stance on the above points and also the criticism voiced to the EU steel lobby and the one-sided stance of the 13 member states who have supported the calls for a Safeguard Review based solely on data supplied by lobbyists.
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Disclaimer: Many things here represent our opinion. Others are information from the Internet. We can therefore never claim to be correct or complete. And never base a business decision solely on the news you receive from us.
