Funds Keep Flowing into AI Stocks; Nikkei at 67,038 Yen at Midday

2026-06-01

Nikkei Average Hits Intraday High in Morning Trade

At the Tokyo stock market on the 1st, the Nikkei Stock Average’s morning close was 708.74 yen, or 1.07%, higher than the previous Friday at 67,038.24 yen, marking a fresh intraday high. Buying centred on leading artificial intelligence-related stocks is lifting the market.

Star Stocks Lead the Rally

In the market, investors continued to favour shares related to multilayer ceramic capacitors, or MLCCs, including SoftBank Group and Kioxia Holdings, as well as Murata Manufacturing and Taiyo Yuden. Takayuki Ishibashi, vice president at Goldman Sachs Securities, said: 'The rise in star stocks is driving the market.'

Kioxia and SoftBank Draw Attention

The focus was on Goldman raising its target price for Kioxia to 93,000 yen from 48,000 yen, and changing its investment rating to 'buy' from 'neutral'. The stock rose as much as 11% to 73,000 yen at one point, expanding its market capitalisation to about 39.7 trillion yen. Toyota Motor, in second place at about 45.7 trillion yen, is now within view.

Analyst Shuhei Nakamura, who covers the company, said that while AI demand is expanding, supply growth in NAND flash memory used for long-term storage will be limited. Based on the view that supply-demand tightness will continue, he revised his view to say profit levels over the next two to three years could be higher and sustainable.

Buying in SoftBank Group shows no sign of stopping. On the 1st, its market capitalisation overtook Toyota Motor, putting it in first place for the first time as a Japanese company. After reports that it plans to build an AI data centre in France with an investment of 1.4 trillion yen, the stock jumped more than 10% and hit an all-time high.

Buying Concentrated in Select Names

Against the backdrop of growing AI demand, funds are also flowing into MLCC stocks that are expected to benefit from data centre demand. Since May, Taiyo Yuden shares have risen 2.3 times and Murata Manufacturing shares are up 87%. Taiyo Yuden’s PER, or price-to-earnings ratio, has climbed from the high-50s at the beginning of May to the high-110s.

Even so, the broader market is not rising across the board. The TOPIX fell on the 1st, and decliners in the TSE Prime market totalled more than 1,100 companies, far exceeding the 413 gainers. Investor risk appetite has not spread across the market as a whole.

Junichi Hashimoto, chief quant analyst at Daiwa Securities, said: 'It is good that the breadth of buying in AI-related names, such as MLCC stocks, is widening.' At the same time, interest is beginning to emerge in value stocks seen as inexpensive on measures such as PBR, or price-to-book ratio, and PER, but for now buying is concentrated in some AI-related names and has not yet led to broad-based stock picking.

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