What happened Shares of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NYSE: TSM) rose by as much as 12.9% in Thursday morning's session. The chip manufacturer, a global leader among the third-party companies that turn processor designs into physical products, delivered a mixed earnings report alongside bullish guidance for the next quarter. As of 2:08 p.m. EST, the stock was still up by 9.2%. So what Taiwan Semiconductor's fourth-quarter revenue increased 14% year over year to $12.7 billion. Earnings per share rose from $0.73 to $0.97. Your average analyst was expecting earnings near $0.94 per share on sales in the neighborhood of $12.9 billion. Looking ahead, TSMC's first-quarter guidance was for revenues of roughly $12.9 billion. The current Wall Street consensus forecast is for revenues to come in at $12.6 billion. Image source: Getty Images. Now what The chipmaker saw strong orders for high-margin chips that go into such tech as 5G smartphones and high-performance computing systems of the enterprise-class variety. The richer product mix explains how TSMC generated a positive bottom-line surprise despite its slight miss on the revenue line. These trends should continue in the next reporting period. The automotive computing sector is also staging a comeback in early 2021, and management promised to prioritize automotive chip orders in the near term, supporting the industry's recovery process. "In TSMC, this is our top priority and we are working closely with our automotive customer to resolve the capacity support issue," CEO C.C. Wei said on the earnings call. Investors were quick to embrace TSMC's solid results and promising outlook. The stock set a new all-time high Thursday, having gained 98% over the last 52 weeks. 10 stocks we like better than Taiwan Semiconductor ManufacturingWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of November 20, 2020 Anders Bylund has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source