We recently published an article titled Why These 15 Semiconductor Stocks Have Been Plunging So Far in 2025. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Ultra Clean Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UCTT) stands against the other semiconductor stocks.

Wall Street has gotten increasingly bearish on semiconductor stocks over the past few months as concerns about the profitability and sustainability of AI have gained traction. This was compounded by DeepSeek at first. The market recovered from that, but as Microsoft started canceling some data center leases and Nvidia failed to beat earnings by stellar margins, sentiment has turned sour again.

AI-related semiconductor stocks, which have been pick-and-shovel plays, are bearing the brunt of the selloffs, as they are the ones sitting on top of a two-year-long rally. This is a cyclical industry, so it’s possible that semiconductor stocks are now shifting into a bearish phase.

You should keep up with these stocks, as they’ve delivered multibagger gains over the past two years. There’s a good chance that the AI narrative recovers from here. And even if it doesn’t, it’s still worth looking into the big losers and the reasons behind their decline.

Methodology

For this article, I screened the worst-performing semiconductor stocks year-to-date.

I will also mention the number of hedge fund investors in these stocks. Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter's strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).

A technician inspecting a series of critical ultra-high purity components.

Ultra Clean Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UCTT)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders In Q4 2024: 22

Ultra Clean Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UCTT) makes subsystems, parts, and ultra-high purity cleaning and analytical products for the semiconductor industry.

The stock is down significantly so far in 2025 as it issued weak Q1 guidance during its Q4 2024 earnings. It projected revenue between $505 million and $555 million, below the analyst consensus of $561.4 million.

It also forecasts EPS of $0.22 to $0.42. This falls short of the $0.54 estimate and caused a drop in the stock.

The company blames a slowdown in its business in China. Moreover, Levi & Korsinsky announced an investigation into potential violations of federal securities laws by Ultra Clean Holdings.

The consensus price target of $56.75 implies 143.14% upside.

Ultra Clean Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:UCTT) stock is down 34.41% year-to-date.

Overall UCTT ranks 10th on our list of the semiconductor stocks that have been plunging so far in 2025. While we acknowledge the potential of UCTT as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than UCTT but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.

 

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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.