TSMC Arizona, the chipmaker’s US subsidiary in Phoenix, earned net income of NT$53.99 billion in the nine months to 30 September, against NT$4.77 billion a year earlier, TSMC’s reviewed consolidated financial statements show. That is 11.3 times the prior-year figure, by our arithmetic, or about US$1.70 billion at the NT$31.744 average rate TSMC used for the period.
The same statements show TSMC received NT$167.59 billion of government grants in the nine months, up from NT$71.90 billion, through its units in the United States, Germany, Japan and China. That equals 13.0% of the NT$1,289.97 billion TSMC spent on property, plant and equipment in the period, by our arithmetic.
Business Pill · Capex and Depreciation
A short explainer on how capital spending turns into depreciation on the income statement. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss TSMC.
The key insight: As we read the statements, TSMC Arizona has moved from a small contributor to a profit centre: NT$53.99 billion of nine-month net income against NT$4.77 billion a year earlier, while grants from four governments covered the equivalent of 13.0% of TSMC’s plant and equipment spending, by our arithmetic.
The figures sit in the statements’ table of investees, which lists each subsidiary’s net income for the period in thousands of New Taiwan dollars. TSMC Arizona’s line reads NT$53,986,224 thousand for the nine months ended 30 September 2026. The same table in last year’s third-quarter statements gives NT$4,769,007 thousand. The increase is 1,032%, by our arithmetic.
The share of that profit TSMC booked was NT$48.56 billion, the table shows. TSMC Arizona’s profit equals 2.6% of the group’s nine-month net income of NT$2,042.92 billion, by our arithmetic. Our Q3 results piece covered the quarter that ended in September.
TSMC keeps putting money in. The original investment amount for TSMC Arizona was NT$759.56 billion at 30 September, against NT$672.62 billion at the end of 2025, a rise of NT$86.94 billion, by our arithmetic. The parent company bought NT$133.95 billion of goods from TSMC Arizona in the nine months, 45% of its purchases, its related-party table shows. Our piece on the Arizona commitment set out the plan behind it.
TSMC Arizona’s net income and the government grants TSMC received, nine months to 30 September 2026 and 2025, in NT$ billions, from TSMC’s reviewed consolidated financialstatements. The grants are the group total across its US, German, Japanese and Chinese units; the multiples are our arithmetic.
What the Grants Note Says
Note 28 of the statements says subsidiaries such as TSMC Arizona, ESMC, JASM and TSMC Nanjing received subsidies from the governments of the United States, Germany, Japan and China. It says they were “mainly used to subsidize the purchase costs of property, plant and equipment, as well as partial costs and expenses incurred from plant construction and production”.
The note gives the total, NT$167,586,589 thousand for the nine months, against NT$71,897,986 thousand a year earlier, 2.33 times as much, by our arithmetic. It says the grant agreements “include the construction timelines and other conditions that must be complied with”.
The note adds a US tax credit. It says “TSMC Arizona is also eligible to apply for a 25% investment credit for its qualified investment”, and that from 1 January 2026 the rate rose to 35% of the qualified investment amount after the rules were amended.
The Grants Against TSMC’s Spending
In the cash flow statement the grants appear as proceeds from government grants for property, plant and equipment, NT$167.59 billion. TSMC spent NT$1,289.97 billion acquiring property, plant and equipment in the nine months, up from NT$915.50 billion. The grants equal 13.0% of that spending, and 8.2% of nine-month net income, by our arithmetic.
In US dollars at the same NT$31.744 rate, the grants come to about US$5.28 billion, by our arithmetic. Our piece on the Phoenix campus looked at what the Arizona site is drawing around it.
The Structural Read
As we read the two lines together, the grants are a group total and the profit is one unit’s: the statements do not say how much of the NT$167.59 billion went to TSMC Arizona, so the two cannot be netted against each other.
As we read the related-party table, the Arizona plant already ships to its parent at scale: TSMC bought NT$133.95 billion from it in the nine months, 45% of the parent company’s purchases.
TSMC consolidated financialstatements, nine months to 30 September 2026, Note 28
“The aforementioned subsidiaries have signed grant agreements with the local governments. The agreements include the construction timelines and other conditions that must be complied with.”
Three Implications
FOR TSMC INVESTORS TSMC Arizona’s nine-month net income is 2.6% of the group’s NT$2,042.92 billion, by our arithmetic; the grants equal 8.2% of group net income.
FOR READERS OF SUBSIDY FIGURES The note reports a nine-month total across the US, Germany, Japan and China, not a quarterly or per-country figure.
FOR THE ARIZONA BUILD-OUT TSMC’s original investment in TSMC Arizona rose by NT$86.94 billion in nine months, by our arithmetic; our piece on the Arizona commitment sets out the plan.
The framework records: “the capex race is no longer a corporate spending cycle. It is a sovereign-scale financing problem dressed in tech-company clothing”.
As we read it, NT$167.59 billion of grants from four governments in nine months fits that picture of state money in the build-out. The framework does not discuss TSMC’s grants.
TSMC’s spending on property, plant and equipment in the nine months to 30 September 2026 against the government grants it received in the period, from its reviewed consolidated financialstatements. The share is our arithmetic.
What Is Not Established
The note gives one total. It does not split the grants by country or subsidiary, so the statements do not show how much came from the US. It reports nine-month figures, not a third-quarter amount for the grants. The table gives TSMC Arizona’s net income, not its revenue or margin, and does not say what drove the rise.
The statements do not say which of the conditions in the grant agreements have been met. TSMC was not contacted for this piece.
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TSMC Arizona’s nine-month net income rose to NT$53.99 billion from NT$4.77 billion, 11.3 times, and the grants TSMC received across four countries reached NT$167.59 billion, 13.0% of its spending on plant and equipment, by our arithmetic. The statements give the grants as one total, so the US share is not shown.
A note on sourcing. The figures come from TSMC’s consolidated financialstatements for the nine months ended 30 September 2026, with the auditors’ review report, filed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange’s Market Observation Post System, which we read on 14 November; the prior-year TSMC Arizona figure is from the same table in the 2025 statements. Amounts are reported in thousands of New Taiwan dollars; the billions, multiples, shares and US dollar conversions at TSMC’s NT$31.744 average rate are our arithmetic. TSMC was not contacted for this piece.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
