BUZZ-HP at year-lows rounds off a hard week for hardware

** Nearly $50 bln was wiped off the market value of global tech hardware & chipmakers in 3 days this week bringing back memories of similar sharp selloffs last year

** While a specific trigger was difficult to pin down, worries about PC shipments, sluggish forecasts from chipmakers and broker downgrades came together to clip the sector

** The SOX's near 8 pct drop takes index below its March 12 low darkening the chart outlook

** Rounding things off Hewlett-Packard shares hit a 52-wk low intraday on Friday following a price target cut at BAML

** Meanwhile in Asia, bellwether TSMC fell for 6 straight days following comments it made at a tech conference about customers seeing rising inventories as FX moves hinder demand

** The tech/semis-heavy Taiwanese stock market saw net foreign outflow of $368 mln on Thursday -- its second sharpest outflow this year

** In Europe it was sell first, ask questions later as ASML got sold off in sympathy with TSMC's slide though weakness spread to other stocks such as ARM Holdings (LSE: ARM.L - news) and Infineon even though they aren't strictly comparable

** Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS-PB - news) said in a note that bellwethers will need to assure that fundamentals are intact as the next earnings season gets underway in 2-3 weeks before investors have the confidence to buy the dip aggressively (RM (LSE: RM.L - news) : lance.tupper.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net; RM: vikram.subhedar.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net)