“It’s DeepSeek for sure,” said one Tokyo-based fund manager of the sudden drop in Japanese tech shares, adding that the market was readjusting to the idea that hardware spending on AI — a theme that had benefited certain Japanese companies — could be a lot lower than current estimates.

Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek rocked global technology stocks Monday, casting doubt on the validity of the sky-high valuations for leading companies like Nvidia Corp.