Rising competition, it might not be the only factor impacting the chip sector next year.

Geopolitical risk surrounding Taiwan is another key headwin that's in focus.

Our Sima Modi is here with today's tech check.

Hey, Sima.

Hey, Frank, that's right.

Invidia may have led the chip rally in 2024, but Wall Street analysts are quick to point

to other semiconductor stocks that offer promise next year, with a number of them betting on,

yes, Broadcom, following its insanely strong outlook for the coming years.

Morgan Stanley analyst Joseph Moore also likes small-cap Astera Labs, its broad range of connectivity

products that are becoming more pervasive across the industry.

As it pertains to Nvidia's key competitor, advanced micro devices,

more remains on the sidelines. In fact, Dylan Patel at semi-analysis, he's sort of the guy

to watch. He did a deeper dive on the battle between AMD and NVIDIA. His research shows that as much

as AMD is trying to play catch-up, Nvidia engineers are working overtime to deepen their moat with new software libraries,

performance updates. What all these companies do have in common, though, is a great dependence

on Taiwan and the main supplier of chips, TSM, which makes the sector more vulnerable to rising

geopolitical tensions between Taiwan and China. The importance of chip production in Taiwan creates a strong incentive for China to protect that industry.

That's true, but only as far as it goes, because it's important to remember that Xi Jinping is a security first leader.

He has shown he's willing to endure real economic pain. Christopher adds that if

President-elect Trump makes a deal with Russia and allows part of Ukraine to be annexed, that could

embolden China to make a move on Taiwan, which does bring up the topic of Intel, our country's

best bet at onsharing AI chip production, but given the

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