Catenaa, Wednesday, January 21, 2026- Intel stock rose over 10% as shareholders are optimistic about the company’s results, like they have not been for many quarters, betting the turnaround CEO Lip-Bu Tan promised was taking root.
A slew of high-profile investments engineered by Tan last year piqued investor interest in a stock that had crashed in 2024 following years of management missteps, including a botched AI product roadmap that led to deep competitive losses and thousands of job cuts.
Intel’s stock rose by 10% by noon on Wednesday, and the stock gained 84% in 2025, far outperforming the benchmark semiconductor index’s 42% rise.
The company is slated to report fourth-quarter results after markets close on Thursday.
A $5 billion investment from Nvidia and $2 billion from SoftBank, alongside the US government’s stake in the company, have strengthened Intel’s balance sheet and given Tan the flexibility to begin reshaping the company’s manufacturing and AI strategy.
Tan has also overhauled the company’s chipmaking operations and tightened what he said was a bloated management structure.
At least 10 brokerages have raised their price targets or ratings for Intel over the last two months, indicating higher expectations from the company.
Intel is likely to report a more than 30% jump in its data center business to $4.43 billion for the quarter ended December, according to data compiled by LSEG.
The jump could be attributed to big tech companies building out advanced data centers that need Intel’s traditional server chips and CPUs alongside graphics processors made by the likes of Nvidia.
Sales in Intel’s personal computer unit likely rose 2.5% to $8.21 billion.
Intel has been consistently losing share in the PC market to rival AMD and chip blueprint designer Arm, and may now also face weaker PC demand as a global shortage of memory chips has boosted memory chip prices and made laptops more expensive.
