Taiwan chip design firm Faraday (智原) surged to its daily limit up after landing its largest contract ever, a sign investors are betting big on AI chip demand.

• Faraday secured a multi-million-dollar order to design a 2-nanometer AI chip for a U.S. cloud company, its biggest deal in company history.
• The stock hit the daily price-limit cap right at the open, with huge buy orders stacking up and few sellers willing to let go.
• The customer upgraded from an older chip process to the newer 2-nanometer tech to make the product last longer, and first revenue from the deal should land in 2027.
• Faraday is teaming up with Samsung for manufacturing plus United Microelectronics and memory makers for other parts of the project, showing how AI chip orders are getting split across multiple suppliers.
• The broader Taiwan stock market also rose as investors wait on earnings from major tech names this week, which could decide whether the market keeps recovering from last week's selloff.

Outlook: If the 2-nanometer AI chip trend keeps spreading to other customers, Faraday and its manufacturing partners could see more large orders follow.