Kathmandu. Asian stock markets were mixed on Wednesday, but some markets rallied on the back of a sharp rise in tech stocks. Investors have been cautiously optimistic about the prospect of a peace deal between the United States and Iran.

The market has steadily reached new highs this year due to the huge increase in the shares of artificial intelligence (AI) technology companies.

South Korea’s market rose more than 2 percent on Wednesday, with shares of chipmaker SK Hynix rising 11 percent to a market value of $1 trillion. With this, SK Hynix has become one of only three $1 trillion companies in Asia, along with Samsung Electronics and Taiwan’s TSMC, that produce chips for AI systems.

According to Stephen Innis, an analyst at SPI Asset Management, the market has clearly sent a message that the demand for AI is no longer limited to chips running large language models, but extends to the memory systems needed to run those models at scale.

At the same time, investors are also keeping an eye on talks between Washington and Tehran aimed at preventing war in the Middle East. Despite recent reports of a ceasefire, tensions have escalated again after Monday’s US strike. Tehran has accused the United States of breaking the ceasefire and threatened to retaliate against US targets in the Gulf.

Brent crude, the international benchmark, rose about 4.5 percent on Tuesday to above $100 a barrel following the U. S. invasion.