By Nathan Vifflin and Ozan Ergenay
VELDHOVEN (Reuters) -ASML, the world's biggest supplier of computer chip-making equipment, on Wednesday warned that it may not achieve growth in 2026, even after its second quarter bookings beat market expectations.
Analysts had hoped that the quarter would provide some reassurance over its outlook for 2026. However, the company warned that geopolitical uncertainty continued to cloud its prospects.
"The level of uncertainty is increasing, mostly due to macroeconomic
and geopolitical consideration. And that includes, of course, tariffs", ASML's chief executive Christophe Fouquet said in an internal interview published on the company's website.
"While we still prepare for growth in 2026, we cannot confirm it at this stage", Fouquet said in a statement.
If it materialized, 2026 would be the first flat year in over a decade of uninterrupted revenue growth since 2012.
ASML investor Han Dieperink, chief investment officer at investment firm Aureus, said he was not worried about the upcoming year, noting that the quarter pointed to solid demand.
The Dutch group's net bookings, the most closely watched figure in the industry, were 5.54 billion euros ($6.4 billion). That was ahead of analysts' consensus estimate of 4.44 billion euros, according to researcher Visible Alpha.
"The second quarter beats from top to bottom", analyst Michael Roeg of Degroof Petercam said. Roeg cited strong demand from artificial intelligence related chipmakers.
ASML's EUV lithography machines, the world's most advanced chip circuit printing system, is the key enabling technology behind leading-edge chips like those used in Nvidia's GPUs, or Apple's Macs and iPhones.
($1 = 0.8608 euros)
(Reporting by Nathan Vifflin in Amsterdam; Editing by Matt Scuffham and Kim Coghill)
