AMD to report Q2 earnings as chip stocks continue to waver

AMD will report Q2 earnings on Tuesday as chip stocks have dropped 20% since mid-June. AMD stock is up 194% in the last 12 months, driven by AI demand for CPUs. The company launched its Helios rackscale platform, which CEO Lisa Su claims offers 15% better compute performance and 30% more tokens per dollar than Nvidia's systems.

AMD AMD https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/AMD/ will report its second quarter earnings after the bell on Tuesday as investors continue to navigate the choppiness across chip stocks. After a massive run-up across the sector that saw the Philadelphia Semiconductor index ^SOX https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/^SOX/ jump more than 100% over the last year, chip stocks have paused since roughly mid-June, with the group dropping 20% as of midday Friday, according to AlphaSpace data. AMD stock has climbed an impressive 194% in the last 12 months, thanks to the rise of AI agents. AI agents rely on central processing units CPUs to perform tasks for users, such as preparing spreadsheets or sending emails. That's made CPUs, like the ones AMD produces, far more important to hyperscalers like Microsoft MSFT https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/MSFT/ and other AI cloud companies. That, however, has also helped AMD rival Intel INTC https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/INTC/ , which is up more than 340% in the same timeframe. But AMD has a trick up its sleeve that Intel doesn't. Late last month, the company launched its Helios rackscale platform https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/article/amd-launches-helios-system-in-direct-challenge-to-nvidias-ai-dominance-183000104.html for AI data centers. The system, which features 72 AMD MI455X graphics processing units GPUs , as well as several of the company's Instinct CPUs, is designed to go toe-to-toe with Nvidia's NVDA https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/NVDA/ own Blackwell and Rubin-based NVL72 rack-scale systems. CEO Lisa Su isn't shy about taking on Nvidia either. The two companies have competed in the gaming graphics card space for years. According to Su, the Helios rack provides 15% better compute performance than Vera Rubin and offers 50% more high-bandwidth memory capacity. Helios, she added, also provides 30% more tokens per dollar than Nvidia's servers. Nvidia dominates the AI chip space, accounting for as much as 90% of market share https://my.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS53264225 in any given quarter. But even a small slice of that would be a boon for AMD. For the quarter, AMD is expected to report earnings per share of $1.62 on revenue of $11.3 billion, according to Bloomberg analysts' consensus estimates. The company saw EPS of $0.48 and revenue of $7.6 billion in the same quarter last year. Data center growth is expected to top 100%, climbing to $6.5 billion, versus $3.2 billion in Q2 2025. AMD's client segment is expected to generate $3 billion in sales, up 20%, while its gaming division is set to bring in $781 million, down 30%. The PC industry is facing a downturn as a result of increased memory prices, which could impact AMD and Intel's PC chips businesses in the coming months. Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoofinance.com. Follow him on X at @DanielHowley . Click here for the latest technology news that will impact the stock market . Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance