Shares surged 20% on earnings and are now up over 100% YTD. Here’s how the comeback story is playing out.
After we heard from Intel on Thursday night, the stock surged more than 20%, extending a massive run that’s now pushed shares up over 100% year-to-date. Wall Street is clearly getting more confident in the turnaround in CEO Lip-Bu Tan’s plan to turn the company around.
Here are three key takeaways driving the move:
1. From Surviving to Scaling
- Investors are starting to believe that Intel has moved beyond simply stabilizing the business. The narrative is shifting toward scaling, particularly as demand tied to AI and compute infrastructure continues to rise.
2. CPUs Are Back in the Spotlight
- While GPUs have dominated the AI conversation, CPUs are quietly becoming critical again.
- As Agentic AI systems expand, demand for general-purpose compute is increasing. More AI agents means more processing and that’s driving renewed interest in CPUs
- It’s also why competitors like Advanced Micro Devices and Arm Holdings moved higher on the report.
3. The Foundry Bet Is Getting Real
- Perhaps the most important shift is happening inside Intel’s foundry business.
- This is where Intel is trying to compete directly with TSMC. Recent developments suggest they’re progressing. The company highlighted new opportunities with major players like Tesla and Google, and even teased a potential deal with a new large customer.
- More importantly, Intel is working to leverage its foundry to manufacture more of its own chips. This woudl be a return to the vertically integrated model that once defined its dominance.
To be clear, this wasn’t a perfect quarter. Revenue grew just 7% year-over-year, and much of the stock’s reaction appears driven by beating expectations and positioning rather than realized growth.
As Intel moves from rebuilding to executing, the next phase will be about proving it can meet the demand it’s been promising.