CITIC Securities says weakening investment from property and traditional
infrastructure contrasts with a long-term uplift in compute demand driven by
massive AI workloads and rising capex by Chinese and US firms, leaving scope for
higher domestic compute spending. China’s “six networks” rollout could unlock
trillion-yuan compute investment, creating large-scale import-substitution
opportunities for domestic chips, memory and optical communications. China’s
power supply and lower green-power costs, together with accelerated direct
renewable connections and source–grid–load–storage integration, bolster a
compute–power competitive edge. Data center build-outs will materially lift
demand for copper, tin and other industrial metals; semiconductor tightness will
transmit to upstream raw materials and downstream electronics; broader funding
channels for data-center REITs are supporting capacity expansion. CITIC expects
sustained price gains in industrial metals, semiconductors and end-users
electronics and views compute- and power-related supply chains as medium- to
long-term allocation opportunities.
