TLDR
- Analysts expect Q1 adjusted EPS of $0.02, down from $0.13 a year ago, on revenue of ~$12.4 billion
- Intel’s foundry segment is projected to post a $2.4 billion operating loss in Q1, with only one internal customer
- INTC stock is up 235% over the past year, recently hitting a new high of $70.33, trading at 92x forward earnings
- Intel’s data center market share fell from 71% in 2021 to just 7% last year, with Nvidia taking the lion’s share
- Key deals with Nvidia, Google, Elon Musk’s Terafab, and a factory buyback from Apollo are reshaping the story
Intel reports first-quarter earnings Thursday after the bell. The numbers themselves aren’t the main event — it’s what CEO Lip-Bu Tan says about landing outside customers for the foundry business that investors are really waiting for.
Wall Street expects Q1 adjusted EPS of $0.02, down sharply from $0.13 in the same period last year. Revenue is projected at around $12.4 billion, a roughly 2% decline year over year.
The stock has had a remarkable run. From a low of $17.67 just a year ago, INTC has surged 235%, recently hitting an all-time high of $70.33 last week. It now trades at 92 times forward earnings — compared to around 21x for the broader S&P 500.
That valuation isn’t being driven by near-term profits. It’s being driven by deals and political momentum.
Tan sold a 9% stake in Intel to the U.S. government, earning a warm reception from the Trump White House. He also struck a partnership with Nvidia that included a 4.5% stake in Intel for the AI chip giant. Then came a deal with Elon Musk’s companies to build the Terafab facility in Texas, producing chips for SpaceX, xAI, and Tesla.
Intel also struck a multiyear deal with Google to power AI and inference workloads on Google Cloud using its Xeon CPUs. And in a notable move, the company agreed to buy back a 49% stake in a fabrication plant it sold to Apollo Global Management in 2024 — paying $14.2 billion for an asset it sold for $11.2 billion.
The Foundry Problem Hasn’t Gone Away
The foundry segment remains the core challenge. It currently has just one customer: Intel itself. Analysts expect it to post a $2.4 billion operating loss in Q1.
Tan has been clear that the next generation of manufacturing technology will require outside revenue to fund. Without external customers, the math doesn’t work.
Intel’s manufacturing has lagged Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing for years, and that gap made it hard to attract the big fabless chip companies that TSMC relies on. Closing that gap — or convincing customers to commit before the gap is fully closed — is the real test.
PC Weakness Adding Pressure
The Client Computing segment, which covers PC chips, makes up around 57% of projected Q1 revenue. That business is under pressure from a global memory shortage pushing up PC prices and damping demand.
The International Data Corporation expects global PC market unit volumes to fall 11.3% in 2026, though higher average selling prices should keep revenue roughly flat. Intel expects Client Computing revenue of around $7.1 billion in Q1, down about 7% year over year.
On the brighter side, Intel’s Data Center and AI segment is expected to bring in $4.41 billion in Q1, up 6.8% year over year. The company flagged supply constraints on its data center chips in Q4 but said it expects those to ease after Q1.
The rise of AI agents — which rely heavily on CPUs for tasks like web browsing and data processing — is giving Intel’s core product a new relevance in the AI infrastructure buildout.
Intel said it faced supply constraints on data center chips in Q4 2025 and expects conditions to improve through 2026.
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