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TOKYO—Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing is delaying construction of a second plant in Japan partly because it is pouring funds more quickly into U.S. expansion ahead of potential Trump administration tariffs, people familiar with the plans said.
The revised schedule is the latest example of how President Trump’s aggressive stance on trade is pulling some investment toward the U.S. at the expense of allies. Major technology companies have committed to expand U.S. production of artificial-intelligence servers that are currently made in places such as Mexico and Taiwan.
The tariffs should be punitive enough to push the US fabless semi companies to diversify their supply chains with Intel (Samsung unfortunately delayed their Taylor fab). So TSMC has a 20-25k wspm of N4 available now with fab 1, assuming fab 2 brings another 20-25k wspm of N3 in 2027, fabless will have to eat the cost or work with alternatives.
TSMC is an exporter. Tariffs are for importers. TSMC's clients will pass tariffs onto the customers. Since there are no TSMC alternatives this will not hurt TSMC. TSMC even got further tax credits from the Big Beautiful US tax bill. TSMC is winning, the US customer is losing. I'm sure Jensen is bowing down to the Tariff gods right now.
