These 10 Chinese stocks are powering U.S. data centers

While the artificial intelligence race has focused largely on advanced semiconductors, a slew of mainland China-listed companies produce many of the parts needed to make data centers work. "The United States relies on Chinese firms for almost 30% of its imports of AI-related products," Michael Hirson and Houze Song at 22V Research wrote in a June 21 report, published in partnership with Analyst Hub Securities. "China lacks the capacity to make advanced chips at scale but plays a central role in the less sexy parts of the data center supply chain, including energy storage, transformers, critical minerals, and chemicals," the analysts said. "This quiet story is becoming increasingly important for investors to monitor." AI-related exports have accounted for about half the growth in China's overall exports this year, the 22V Research report said, noting many of the companies are listed in Shenzhen. Hardware names have driven significant growth in Chinese stocks this year. The ChiNext index that tracks Shenzhen-listed companies has doubled over the last 12 months. The 22V Research report looked at stocks in the CSI 300 index, which covers the largest companies traded in both Shenzhen and Shanghai. Among the 10 biggest AI supply chain companies by market cap, the report found that other than battery giant CATL , the nine other names had all at least doubled in the 12 months as of May. …