Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015

On Oct. 20, IBM� (NYSE: IBM  ) handed in a dud of an earnings report. The company badly missed analyst estimates on both the top and bottom lines, and the stock crashed 8% immediately after the quarterly numbers were released.

If there's a silver lining, it's that IBM is continuing the painful yet necessary step of divesting its hardware business. Although that is weighing on IBM today, these moves will pave the way for a brighter future. Here's what investors searching for value in IBM shares need to know now.

IBM's horrible quarter
IBM posted an operating profit of $3.68 per share on revenue of $22.4 billion in the most recent quarter. This came in well short of expectations for $23.37 billion in revenue and $4.31 per share of operating earnings. Management attributed the weak results to poor client orders in September.

At the same time, IBM continued to see progress in its core strategic initiatives. In short, the scourge of underperforming hardware businesses continued. IBM announced it would shed its semiconductor business to chipmaker GlobalFoundries. What's amazing about this deal is that IBM is actually paying GlobalFoundries $1.5 billion to take the money-losing�semiconductor business off its hands.This says a lot about where IBM is in hardware. That being said, this is what IBM must do as it moves forward with its years-old�turnaround efforts.

Top 5 Wireless Telecom Stocks To Own For 2016: Applied Materials Inc.(AMAT)

Applied Materials, Inc. provides manufacturing equipment, services, and software to the semiconductor, flat panel display, solar photovoltaic (PV), and related industries worldwide. The company?s Silicon Systems Group segment offers a range of manufacturing equipment used to fabricate semiconductor chips or integrated circuits. This segment provides systems that perform primary processes used in chip fabrication, including atomic layer deposition, chemical vapor deposition, physical vapor deposition, electrochemical deposition, rapid thermal processing, chemical mechanical planarization, wet cleaning, and wafer metrology and inspection, as well as systems that etch or inspect circuit patterns on masks used in the photolithography process. Its Applied Global Services segment offers products and services designed to enhance the performance and productivity, and reduce the environmental impact of the fab operations of semiconductor, liquid crystal displays (LCDs), and solar P V manufacturers. The company?s Display segment provides products for manufacturing thin film transistor LCDs for televisions, personal computers (PCs), tablet PCs, smartphones, and other consumer-oriented electronic applications. Its Energy and Environmental Solutions segment offers manufacturing systems for the generation and conservation of energy, as well as manufacturing solutions for wafer-based crystalline silicon applications. This segment also provides roll-to-roll vacuum Web coating systems for deposition of a range of films on flexible substrates for functional, aesthetic, or optical properties; and roll-to-roll machine for depositing ultra-thin aluminum films for flexible packaging applications. The company serves manufacturers of semiconductor wafers and chips, flat panel LCDs, solar PV cells and modules, and other electronic devices. Applied Materials, Inc. was founded in 1967 and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Paul Ausick]

  We have tracked the key short interest changes as of September 30 in the following semiconductor leaders: Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD), Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU), SanDisk Corp. (NASDAQ: SNDK), Qualcomm Inc. (NASDAQ: QCOM), ARM Holdings PLC (NASDAQ: ARMH), Broadcom Corp. (NASDAQ: BRCM), Marvell Technology Group Ltd. (NASDAQ: MRVL), Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA), Texas Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ: TXN) and Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT). We also chose to look at how the Market Vectors Semiconductor ETF (NYSEMKT: SMH) has held up.

• [By Jake L'Ecuyer]

  Shares of Applied Materials (NASDAQ: AMAT) got a boost, shooting up 9.31 percent to $17.48 after the company announced its plans to acquire Tokyo Electron in an all-share deal.

Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015: Advantest Corp (ATE)

Advantest Corporation, incorporated in December 1954, is a part of Advantest group. The Company operates in three segments: semiconductor and component test system segment; mechatronics system segment, focusing on peripheral devices including test handlers and device interfaces, and services, support and others segment. The semiconductor and component test system segment provides customers with test system products for the semiconductor industry and the electronic component industry. The mechatronics system segment focuses on peripheral devices to the semiconductor and component test systems. The services, support and others segment consists of comprehensive customer solutions provided in connection with the semiconductor and component test system and mechatronics system segments, support services and an equipment lease business.

Semiconductor and Component Test Systems Segment

Semiconductor and component test systems are used during the semiconductor and electronic component manufacturing process to confirm that a semiconductor functions properly. Semiconductor and component test systems consist of test systems for memory semiconductors and test systems for non memory semiconductors. Advantest�� test systems for memory semiconductors are test systems designed to test high-speed/high performance dynamic random access memory (DRAM) semiconductors used in equipment such as personal computers and servers, as well as flash memory semiconductors used in digital consumer products.

Test systems for memory semiconductors consist of a mainframe and one or more test heads. During testing, a device interface is attached to the test head. During the front-end testing process, wafers are loaded by a prober and are connected to the test system for memory semiconductors through the device interface. Electric signals between the die and the test systems for memory semiconductors are transmitted through probe pins located in the device interface and tested. After front-end te! sting is completed, the wafer is diced into separate dies and properly functioning dies are packaged. During back-end testing, test handlers are used to load these packaged devices onto the test heads, and electric signals are transmitted between the devices and the test heads via the device interface and tested. The test results are analyzed by the test systems for memory semiconductors��hardware circuits and software programs. Customized software programs for each semiconductor are required to analyze the semiconductor tests and test data.

Advantest�� main product lines of test systems for memory semiconductors are the T5500 series, the T5300 series and the T5700 series. The T5593 is a test system targeted at the market for high speed memory semiconductors, such as DDR2- Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (SDRAM) and Synchronous Graphics Random Access Memory (SGRAM). The T5383 is a multi-functional test system for memory semiconductors that reduces testing costs for semiconductor manufacturers. Advantest�� main line of test systems for non memory semiconductors relates to test systems for SoC semiconductors, test systems for liquid crystal display (LCD) driver integrated circuits and test systems for semiconductors used in car electronics. The T6577 test systems for SoC semiconductors in the T6500 series were primarily developed to test micro controller unit (MCU) and SoC semiconductors that control digital consumer products at the production lines. The T6300 series are test systems for LCD driver integrated circuits used with high-definition LCD displays. The T7721, T7722 and T7723 are test systems for non memory semiconductors for mixed signal integrated circuits. The T8571A is a test system for non memory semiconductors that is primarily used to evaluate and analyze CCDs which are image sensors.

Mechatronics System Segment

The Main products in the Mechatronics System Segment are test handlers which handle semiconductor devices and automate the te! sting, an! d device interfaces which are the interfaces with devices being tested. Test handlers are used with semiconductor and component test systems to handle, condition temperature, contact and sort semiconductors and other electronic components during the back-end testing of the semiconductor manufacturing process. Advantest�� test handlers are sold primarily in conjunction with the sale of its semiconductor and component test systems. The M6242 test handler for test systems for memory semiconductors, including DDR-3SDRAM, can handle up to 512 semiconductors at a time. Advantest�� test handlers for non memory semiconductors, including SoC semiconductors, are the M4841, the M4741A and the M4742A, among others.

Advantest develops and manufactures device interfaces for semiconductor and component test systems and supplies device interfaces, such as high performance and high density connectors, socket boards and sockets. For test systems for memory semiconductors, Advantest provides motherboards capable of handling a maximum of 512 semiconductors at a time. For test systems for non memory semiconductors, Advantest provides motherboards that are compatible with a maximum of 3,072 signals. Advantest also provides motherboards designed for use in front-end testing. Advantest provides custom manufacturing of socket boards and performance boards for each device under test in accordance with customers��specifications.

Advantest provides sockets for test systems for memory semiconductors. Advantest provides low-inductance (0.4nH) sockets and fine pitch (0.4mm) sockets for semiconductors that are becoming more high-speed and more compact in size. Advantest provides carrying and contacting mechanism components compatible with each device under test for test handlers for memory semiconductors and test handlers for non memory semiconductors.

Services, Support and Others Segment

In the services, support and others segment, Advantest has focused on maintenance serv! ices, suc! h as installation and repair of Advantest�� products. It also focused on lease and rental services of its products as a part of Advantest�� effort to provide customers with comprehensive solutions.

The Company competes with Teradyne, Inc., Verigy Ltd., LTX-Credence Corporation, Yokogawa Electronic Corporation, FROM30 CO., LTD., EXICON Ltd., UniTest Inc., Delta Design, Inc., Seiko Epson Corporation, Mirae Corporation, TechWing, Inc., TSE Co., Ltd. and Secron Co., Ltd.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Dan Carroll]

  Nissan's done better this year than electronics maker Advantest (NYSE: ATE  ) , but this stock absolutely blew up over the past week. Advantest's shares shot higher by more than 9%, wiping out pessimism over the company's weak earnings released a few weeks ago. Advantest's net loss and operating profit both fell below its guidance, and despite this week's investor optimism, the future's murky for this company. Financial site TheStreet downgraded the stock last week, citing Advantest's falling earnings, among other issues.

Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015: Micropac Industries Inc (MPAD)

Micropac Industries, Inc. (Micropac), incorporated on March 3, 1969, manufactures and distributes various types of hybrid microelectronic circuits, solid state relays, power operational amplifiers, and optoelectronic components and assemblies. Micropac�� products are used as components in a range of military, space and industrial systems, including aircraft instrumentation and navigation systems, power supplies, electronic controls, computers, medical devices, and high-temperature (200o degree Celsius) products. The Company�� products are either custom (being application-specific circuits designed and manufactured to meet the particular requirements of a single customer) or standard components. During the fiscal year ended December 31, 2011 (fiscal 2011), its custom-designed components accounted for approximately 34% of its revenue and standard components accounted for approximately 66% of its revenue.

Micropac occupies approximately 36,000 square feet of manufacturing, engineering and office space in Garland, Texas. The Company owns 31,200 square feet of that space and leases an additional 4,800 square feet. It also sub-contracts some manufacturing to Inmobiliaria San Jose De Ciuddad Juarez S.A. DE C.V, a maquila contract manufacturer in Juarez, Mexico.

Micropac provides microelectronic and optoelectronic components and assemblies along with contract electronic manufacturing services, and offers a range of products sold to the industrial, medical, military, aerospace and space markets. The Microcircuits product line includes custom microcircuits, solid state relays, power operational amplifiers, and regulators. During fiscal 2011, microcircuits product line accounted for 51% of its revenue and the optoelectronics product line accounted for 62% of its business respectively. The Company�� core technology is the packaging and interconnects of miniature electronic components, utilizing thick film and thin film substrates, forming microelectronics circuits. Other technologi! es include light emitting and light sensitive materials and products, including light emitting diodes and silicon phototransistors used in its optoelectronic components, and assemblies.

The Company�� basic products and technologies include custom design hybrid microelectronic circuits, solid state relays and power controllers, custom optoelectronic assemblies and components, optocouplers, light-emitting diodes, Hall-Effect devices, displays, power operational amplifiers, fiber optic components and assemblies, and high temperature (200o degree Celsius) products. Micropac�� products are primarily sold to original equipment manufacturers (OEM��) who serve major markets, which includes military/aerospace, such as aircraft instrumentation, guidance and navigations systems, control circuitry, power supplies and laser positioning; space, which include control circuitry, power monitoring and sensing, and industrial, which includes power control equipment and robotics.

The Company�� products are marketed throughout the United States and in Western Europe. During fiscal 2011, approximately 21% of the Company�� revenue was from international customers. The Company�� major customers include contractors to the United States Government. During fiscal 2010, sales to these customers for the Department of Defense (DOD) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) contracts accounted for approximately 62% of its revenues. The Company�� customers are Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Rockwell Int��, and NASA.

The Company compete with Teledyne Industries, Inc., MS Kennedy, Honeywell, Avago and International Rectifier.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Geoff Gannon] strong>ADDvantage Technologies (AEY)

  路 Solitron Devices (SODI)

  路 OPT-Sciences (OPST)

  Micropac

  Micropac is 76% owned by Heinz-Werner Hempel. He�� a German businessman. You can see the German company he founded here. He�� had control of Micropac for a long-time. I don�� have an exact number in front of me. But I would guess it�� been something like 25 years.

  ADDvantage

  ADDvantage Technologies is controlled by the Chymiak brothers. See the company�� April 4 press release explaining their decision to turn over the CEO position to an outsider. Regardless, the Chymiaks still control 47% of the company. Ken Chymiak is now chairman. And David Chymiak is still a director and now the company�� chief technology officer. Clearly, it�� still their company.

  By the way, the name ADDvantage Technologies has nothing to do with the Chymiaks. Today�� AEY really traces its roots to a private company called Tulsat. The Chymiak brothers acquired that company about 27 years ago. So, effectively, when you buy shares of AEY you are buying into a 27-year-old family-controlled company.

  That�� pretty typical in the world of net-nets.

  Solitron

  Solitron Devices is 29% owned by Shevach Saraf. He has been the CEO for 20 years. The post-bankruptcy Solitron has never known another CEO. Before the bankruptcy, Solitron was a much bigger, much different company. So even though we are not talking about the founder here ��and even though 70% of the company�� shares are not held by the CEO ��we��e still talking about a company where one person has a lot of control. Solitron only has three directors. Saraf is the chairman, CEO, president, CFO and treasurer. Neither of the other two directors joined the board within the last 15 years. So, we aren�� talking about a lot of tumult at the top.

  In fact, profitable net-nets seem to be especially common candidates for abandoning the responsibilities of a public comp

• [By Geoff Gannon] % of NCAV, has similar (slightly better) z- and f-scores, a FCF margin of 6%, but has ROA of 28%.
  
  ADDvantage (AEY) sells at 95% of NCAV, has similar (in the ballpark) scores and FCF and ROA of 23%.

  The slightly better businesses are currently more expensive in terms of price/NCAV. They have less asset-based downside protection, but they are better businesses.

  How do you quantify and qualify what is cheap enough? To me, there's a big difference in relative cheapness in a company selling at 74% of NCAV versus one selling at 95%. I'm wondering if I'm putting too much weight on this cheapness measurement instead of acknowledging that any decent business selling at less than NCAV is cheap enough. Yet, one has to have some quantifiable idea of when something is not cheap enough anymore.

  Can you help me put this into a unified framework?

  Dan

  There�� a great post over at Oddball Stocks called: �� Stock is a Business�� Read it. Then go over to Richard Beddard�� Interactive Investor Blog. Bookmark that blog. Read it religiously. He looks at Ben Graham type stocks in the U.K. And he looks at them not just as stocks but as pieces of a business.

  Here�� what Richard said in a post called ��iving Up on Mastery of the Universe��

  I need to know:

  1. Whether the managers have made good decisions in the past, and whether their incentives work in the interests of the owners, because those kind of managers often add value to a company.

  2. The products a company sells will still be in demand for years to come, because if they��e not then the past, which we know, does not tell us anything about the future, which we don��.

  3. A company is financially strong enough to withstand the kinds of shocks companies typically experience bearing in mind some are more sensitive to events than others.

  4. How to judge whether the share price undervalues the company, bearing in mind the preceding three factors.

Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015: Sunedison Inc (SUNE)

SunEdison Inc, formerly MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc., incorporated on October 1, 1984, is engaged in the development, manufacture and sale of silicon wafers. The Company is a developer and seller of photovoltaic energy solutions. Through Solar Materials and Solar Energy (SunEdison), it is a developer of solar energy projects. The Company operates in two segments: semiconductor materials and solar energy. The Company�� Solar Energy segment includes the operations of its old Solar Materials segment, as well as its SunEdison business. In the Semiconductor Materials, the Company offers wafers with a variety of features. The Company�� wafers vary in size, surface features, composition, purity levels, crystal properties and electrical properties.

Semiconductor Materials

The Company�� monocrystalline wafers for use in semiconductor applications range in size from 100 millimeter to 300 millimeter and are round in shape for semiconductor customers because of the nature of their processing equipment. Its wafers are used as the starting material for the manufacture of various types of semiconductor devices, including microprocessor, memory, logic and power devices. In turn, these semiconductor devices are used in computers, cellular phones and other mobile electronic devices, automobiles and other consumer and industrial products. Its monocrystalline wafers for semiconductor applications include four general categories of wafers: prime, epitaxial, test/monitor and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers.

The Company�� prime wafer is a polished, pure wafer with an ultraflat and ultraclean surface. The Company�� epitaxial (epi), wafers consist of a thin silicon layer grown on the polished surface of the wafer. Typically, the epitaxial layer has different electrical properties from the underlying wafer. This provides customers with isolation between circuit elements than a polished wafer. Its AEGIS product is designed for certain specialized applications requiring high resis! tivity epitaxial wafers and its MDZ product feature. The AEGIS wafer includes a thin epitaxial layer grown on a standard starting wafer. The AEGIS wafer�� thin epitaxial layer eliminates harmful defects on the surface of the wafer, thereby allowing device manufacturers to increase yields. The Company supplies test/monitor wafers to its customers for use in testing semiconductor fabrication lines and processes. An SOI wafer is a different starting material for the chip making process.

Solar Energy

The Company�� Solar Energy segment provides solar energy services that integrate the design, installation, financing, monitoring, operations and maintenance portions of the downstream solar market to provide a solar energy service to its customers. As of December 31, 2012, SunEdison interconnected over 675 solar power systems representing 989 megawatt of solar energy generating capacity. As of December 31, 2012, SunEdison had 73 megawatt of projects under construction and 2.6 gigawatts in pipeline. In support of its downstream solar business, its Solar Energy segment manufactures polysilicon, silicon wafers and solar modules. Additionally, its Solar Energy segment will sell solar modules to third parties in the event the opportunity aligns with itsinternal needs. It provides its downstream customers with a way to purchase renewable energy by delivering solar power under long-term power purchase arrangements with customers or feed-in tariff arrangements with government entities and utilities. Its SunEdison business is dependent upon government subsidies, including United States federal incentive tax credits, state-sponsored energy credits and foreign feed-in tariffs. The Company�� solar wafers are used as the starting material for crystalline solar cells.

The Company competes with Shin-Etsu Handotai, SUMCO, Siltronic and LG Siltron, SunPower Corporation, First Solar, Inc., Enerparc, Sharp Corporation (Recurrent Energy), Phoenix Solar, BELECTRIC, JUWI Solar Gmbh, and S! olar City! .

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Aaron Levitt]

  Utility NextEra Energy (NEE) is the nation�� largest solar and wind operator and just the latest firm to announce its intention to create a YieldCo. Moody�� estimates that about 30 utilities across the globe have the ability to create a YieldCo today based on current power plant holdings. Aside from the utility space, the various solar panel producers that also own/build grid-scale operations have also expressed their intentions about starting YieldCos. These include SunPower (SPWR) and SunEdison (SUNE).

• [By Paul Ausick]

  Stocks on the move: SunEdison Inc. (NYSE: SUNE) is up 15.9% at $7.89 on news that the firm plans to spin off its semiconductor business.

  In all, 60 stocks put up new 52-week highs today, while 71 stocks posted new lows.

Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015: NVIDIA Corporation(NVDA)

NVIDIA Corporation provides visual computing, high performance computing, and mobile computing solutions that generate interactive graphics on various devices ranging from tablets and smart phones to notebooks and workstations. It operates in three segments: Graphic Processing Unit (GPU), Professional Solutions Business (PSB), and Consumer Products Business (CPB). The GPU segment offers GeForce discrete and chipset products, which support desktop and notebook personal computers plus memory products. The PSB segment provides its Quadro professional workstation products and other professional graphics products, including its NVIDIA Tesla high-performance computing products used in the manufacturing, entertainment, medical, science, and aerospace industries. The CPB segment offers Tegra mobile products, which support tablets, smartphones, personal media players, Internet television, automotive navigation, and other similar devices. This segment also licenses video game consol es and other digital consumer electronics devices. The company sells its products to original equipment manufacturers, original design manufacturers, add-in-card manufacturers, consumer electronics companies, and system builders worldwide that utilize its processors as a core component of their entertainment, business, and professional solutions. NVIDIA Corporation was founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By John Udovich]

  Unlike other chip makers like Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) and NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA), there is something about chip maker Advanced Micro Devices, Inc (NYSE: AMD) and any news about the stock or its products that just brings out both the bulls and the bears at the same time. I should mention that we�previously had�an open position in Advanced Micro Devices in�our�SmallCap Network Elite Opportunity (SCN EO) portfolio from last summer up until�late January when we locked in a small loss. The reason we got out was�not because we lost faith in AMD, but because shares sank�once again�after its latest earnings report - something it had�already done�after three�previous earnings reports. Nevertheless and if you are an investors�with a�long term time horizon rather than a trader,�holding onto AMD may actually�bear some fruit�if you keep in mind some of the latest good news about the stock:�

• [By Lyons George, Eric Bleeker, CFA, and Chris Hill]

  NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA  ) will be releasing its Shield mobile gaming console, which will be a platform for Android-based games, at a $300 price point. Is this going to be a product that will be attractive to consumers? Is there enough content available in terms of Android games geared toward a gamepad to make this an interesting device? In this segment, Lyons and Eric discuss the many challenges NVIDIA's new device will face to find a place in the market, and why this may be way too far out of the company's core competency to succeed.

Best Semiconductor Stocks To Buy For 2015: Micron Technology Inc.(MU)

Micron Technology, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and marketing of semiconductor devices worldwide. Its products include dynamic random access memory (DRAM) products that provide data storage and retrieval, which include DDR2 and DDR3; and other specialty DRAM memory products, including DDR, SDRAM, DDR and DDR2 mobile low power DRAM, pseudo-static RAM, and reduced latency DRAM. The company also offers NAND flash memory products, which are electrically re-writeable and non-volatile semiconductor devices that retain content when power is turned off. In addition, it provides NOR flash memory products that are electrically re-writeable and non-volatile semiconductor memory devices; phase change memory products; and image sensor products. Micron Technology?s products are used in a range of electronic applications, including personal computers, workstations, network servers, mobile phones, flash memory cards, USB storage devices, digital still c ameras, MP3/4 players, and in automotive applications. It sells its products to original equipment manufacturers and retailers through internal sales force, independent sales representatives, and distributors, as well as through a Web-based customer direct sales channel. The company was founded in 1978 and is headquartered in Boise, Idaho.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By MARKETWATCH]

  SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Wall Street hedge-fund investor David Einhorn was active in the last quarter of 2013, taking new stakes in technology and energy companies, while trimming existing holdings in insurer Aetna (AET) , NCR Corp (NCR) and WPX Energy (WPX) , according to an SEC filing Friday. Einhorn's Greenlight Capital picked up stakes in Anadarko Petroleum (APC) , BP (BP) , McDermott Intl. (MDR) , Micron Technolgy (MU) and Take-Two Interactive (TTWO) , according to the latest 13F filing. He trimmed stakes in Aetna, Einstein Noah (BAGL) and WPX Energy, according to the filing.

• [By Selena Maranjian]

  More than a handful of technology-heavy companies had strong performances over the past year. Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU  ) surged 118%, despite challenges from a struggling PC market. Bulls are hopeful that growth in tablets and smartphones will�boost demand�for memory chips. Micron's purchase�of Japanese manufacturer Elpida has some investors quite optimistic, as it boosts Micron's capacity and its relationship with�Apple. Some worry about competition, the commoditization of memory, and Micron's debt levels. The company beat expectations for both revenue and earnings in its last quarter.

• [By Mani]

  Micron Technology, Inc.(NASDAQ:MU) should get increased returns in 2014 from its supplier deal with Inotera Memories, Inc., a leading Taiwanese DRAM memory maker. The deal should improve margins and profitability this year for Micron.

• [By Paul Ausick]

  We have tracked the key short interest changes as of September 30 in the following semiconductor leaders: Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE: AMD), Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU), SanDisk Corp. (NASDAQ: SNDK), Qualcomm Inc. (NASDAQ: QCOM), ARM Holdings PLC (NASDAQ: ARMH), Broadcom Corp. (NASDAQ: BRCM), Marvell Technology Group Ltd. (NASDAQ: MRVL), Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA), Texas Instruments Inc. (NASDAQ: TXN) and Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT). We also chose to look at how the Market Vectors Semiconductor ETF (NYSEMKT: SMH) has held up.