ASML reports Q2 revenue up 28% YoY to €6.9B, vs. €6.74B est., net profit up 35% YoY to €1.9B, vs. €1.82B est., and raises 2023's growth forecast from 25% to 30%
Context & Ripple Effects
This lands two beats into a streak: April's Q1 report had already shown revenue up 91% YoY, so July's 28% growth plus a guidance raise from 25% to 30% reads as management doubling down mid-cycle rather than a surprise inflection. The relationships add texture the headline misses — a one-time €20,000 share award for ~45,000 employees vesting in 2030, reported plans to lift DUV prices 10%, and price discussions with TSMC on EUV.
The follow-on coverage frames how this quarter aged: by October, Q3 revenue came in slightly below estimates and ASML guided 2024 to flat growth, making this Q2 raise the high-water mark of the 2023 cycle before bookings — which later surged 169% QoQ in the January 2025 report — rebuilt the order book.
First-order effects
- Chipmaker customers face rising tool costs immediately: sources point to a 10% DUV price increase and open negotiations with TSMC over EUV pricing, while ASML's ~45,000 employees lock in a €20,000 share award vesting in 2030.
Second-order effects
- Despite the beat-and-raise, ASML shares fell more than 7% after the report — also pressured by reported Chinese DUV manufacturing progress — signaling investors were already pricing the 2023 upgrade cycle as peaking, a call October's flat-2024 guidance would validate.
- If DUV and EUV price increases stick, TSMC and other leading-edge fabs carry higher per-wafer equipment depreciation into their own pricing conversations downstream.
Third-order effects
- The subsequent arc — orders tripling QoQ in early 2024, the 169% bookings jump in January 2025, and two consecutive 2026 forecast raises to €43B-€45B — suggests ASML's guidance cadence has become the cleanest public read on whether AI-driven fab capex is accelerating or cooling.
- Reported Chinese DUV development points toward a longer-run structural question for ASML: whether domestic alternatives erode its captive position in mature-node lithography even as leading-edge EUV demand compounds.
The trend: Semiconductor equipment demand is consolidating around an AI-capex supercycle in which ASML's quarterly guidance revisions serve as the industry's forward indicator, even as China's domestic lithography push builds beneath it.