Super Micro Computer, together with its subsidiaries, develops and manufactures high-performance server and storage solutions based on modular and open architectures. The company serves markets worldwide. Super Micro Computer provides modular blades and blade servers, workstations, full racks, networking devices, GPU computers for training large language models, server software management solutions, and a wide range of related products and components. Super Micro was incorporated in 1993 and is based in San Jose, California.

Stocks weathered another inflation report on Wednesday, as investors gobbled up certain AI names that recently have been smacked. Some of the stocks that ripped Wednesday are very well known among the momentum crowd, as NBIS rocketed 34%, LITE 14%, BE 12%, CIEN 11%, DELL 10%, HPE and COHR 8%, STX 7%, and TER, SNDK, and FORM 6%. Despite the massive ongoing dispersion among individual stocks and the constant worries about geopolitics, energy prices, inflation, future FOMC action, the entire yield curve lifting, etc., the overall market has been eerily quiet over the past six days. Since the July 29 hedge fund blowup, when the Volatility Index (VIX) shot up 13.5% to about 21, the so-called options fear gauge has declined in eight of the past 10 days. The VIX fell almost 5% yesterday to 14.6%, its lowest close since late 2025. The VIX measures the implied volatility of out-of-the-money put and call options on the S&P 500. Its aim is to measure the expected 30-day volatility of the SPX. Going back to 2021, the VIX has averaged about 19. The index generally has been between 12 to 25, with some spikes in 2022, 2023, April 2025, and March 2026. It stayed elevated for months only during the 2022 bear market. The weekly Bollinger Band width is near the lowest level going back to 2021. A low VIX generally occurs during a period when the S&P 500 is crawling higher -- and can stay depressed for months, if not longer. The Nasdaq 100 Volatility Index (VXN) has dropped from 31 on July 29 to 21 -- but remains above the lows from 2024 (between 15 and 16).

Broadcom is one of the largest semiconductor companies in the world and has also expanded into infrastructure software. Its semiconductors primarily serve computing and networking, with custom AI accelerators now accounting for the bulk of the business. It is primarily a fabless designer, but holds some manufacturing in-house, such as for its best-of-breed film bulk acoustic resonator filters that sell into the Apple iPhone. In software, it sells virtualization, infrastructure, and security software to large enterprises, financial institutions, and governments. Broadcom is the product of consolidation. Its businesses are an amalgamation of former companies like legacy Broadcom and Avago Technologies in chips, as well as VMware, Brocade, CA Technologies, and Symantec in software.

Lam Research Corp. supplies WFE and services that are vital to the production of semiconductors. It offers a range of products used in thin film deposition, plasma etch, photoresist strip, and wafer cleaning processes. Lam has grown its SAM to about 34% of total industry spending on WFE, partly by merging with Novellus Systems in 2012. The customer base includes makers of memory and logic chips, with system shipments representing 60%-65% of revenue and services the remaining 35%-40%.