ASML hits targets but orders sag as Trump trolls markets

Dutch lithography king sticks to €35B forecast despite investor jitters

Euro tech giant ASML hit its revenue guidance last quarter and still expects the coffers to swell this year, but order bookings are down as Trump's tariff turmoil casts uncertainty over the entire industry.

The Netherlands-based developer of chipmaking equipment reported total net sales of €7.7 billion ($8.75 billion) for calendar Q1 2025, roughly the midpoint of its previous estimates for the quarter, and up on the €5.3 billion ($6 billion) during the same period last year.

However, investors and analysts were unimpressed by order bookings worth €3.9 billion ($4.4 billion) during the quarter – of which €1.2 billion ($1.3 billion) is for the higher-end EUV kit – compared with Q4 2024 bookings of €7.09 billion ($8 billion). This sent ASML's shares down 6 percent in premarket trading.

This is perhaps why CEO Christophe Fouquet insisted in January that order bookings "are not necessarily a good reflection or an accurate reflection of the business momentum" and said that ASML will stop providing this number in future.

ASML is still the only source for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) photolithography equipment, which can etch finer patterns on silicon wafers, allowing for more transistors to be crammed into chip designs.

Income for EUV this quarter was higher than expected due to a greater sales mix of NXE:3800 machines versus NXE:3600 models. These models differ in the number of wafers they can process per hour.

With regard to the forecast for Q2 2025, ASML estimates total net sales of between €7.2 billion ($8.1 billion) and €7.7 billion ($8.75 billion), which would have to hit the high end of the band in order to avoid dipping below the figure for Q1.

Tariffs have dominated headlines lately, creating vast unease due to the constantly shifting decisions announced by the Trump administration.

Speaking about the effects, Fouquet said: "I think the whole dynamic is still very new and I think the one thing I'd like to say, which is being shared by many experts, many businesses, is that this dynamic is creating a new uncertainty. Especially when it comes to GDP."

However, he insisted on sticking to ASML's earlier forecast that total revenue for calendar 2025 will come in somewhere between €30 billion and €35 billion ($34-40 billion).

CFO Roger Dassen said tariffs pose issues for companies with global operations like ASML.

"So first of all, obviously you have tariffs that could be imposed on shipments of entire systems, new systems into the United States. So that's one category," Dassen said. "The second category would be tariffs imposed on parts and tools that you use for field operations in the United States. The third category could be on what we import into the United States for manufacturing in the US, and the fourth would be any other country imposing tariffs on things that are being shipped from the United States into these countries."

"Those are the different, I would say, direct implications of tariffs. We're very actively working with the entire ecosystem to try and minimize the overall impact on the whole ecosystem as a result of that, once we have a better understanding of how exactly it all works. But clearly our intent is that the impact that it should have on our financials should be as limited as possible."

AI is still seen as driving demand in the semiconductor market, according to Dassen, who added that if this continues and customers add capacity, then ASML may be looking at the upper range of its guidance for this calendar year, so closer to €35 billion.

Fouquet said this is why he currently expects both 2025 and 2026 to be growth years for the biz, despite the tariff uncertainty.

"We expect a shift towards more advanced technology. This is true for Logic, this is true for DRAM. And as we explained at Capital Markets Day these are basically technologies that will require more advanced lithography," he explained. ®