Quick Read – A $1,000 ASML investment made 10 years ago grew to $19,297, outpacing the S&P 500’s $3,500 return by more than 5x. – ASML’s monopoly on EUV lithography makes every advanced chip below 7nm impossible to manufacture without its machines, creating irreplaceable demand….
With a $45 billion backlog and 65% year-to-date gains, ASML now trades at 57 times trailing earnings, making entry price a real risk. – The analyst who called NVIDIA in 2010 just named his top 10 stocks and ASML wasn’t one of them. Get them here FREE
Ten years ago, ASML (NASDAQ:ASML) was a respected Dutch equipment maker quietly perfecting a technology most investors had never heard of: extreme ultraviolet lithography. Today, it is the sole supplier of EUV machines required to print transistors smaller than 7 nanometers, and every cutting-edge chip from TSMC, Samsung, and Intel runs through its tools. The journey was bumpy.
ASML rode the smartphone cycle, then the cloud cycle, then a brutal 2022 to 2023 downturn, then the AI capex explosion. CEO Christophe Fouquet spooked the market in July 2025 when he said he “cannot confirm” 2026 growth, only to deliver record Q4 2025 net bookings of €13.2 billion six months later. The story since: AI customers accelerating capacity plans, a $45.06 billion backlog, and the first High NA EUV system (EXE:5200B) shipped.