{"slug": "intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade", "title": "Intel's Stock Is Up 170% in 2026 After Its Best Quarter in Over a Decade", "summary": "Intel reported second-quarter revenue of $16.1 billion on July 23, up 25% year-over-year, its strongest growth in over 15 years, driven by a 59% jump in Data Center and AI revenue to $6.3 billion. The company swung to non-GAAP earnings of 42 cents per share, double analyst expectations, and guided third-quarter revenue above estimates. Intel's stock, already up roughly 163% for the year, rose 5.2% in after-hours trading, with the rally fueled by reports of a preliminary agreement with Apple for U.S. chip manufacturing, though Intel and Apple have not confirmed the deal.", "body_md": "*Intel just posted its strongest quarterly revenue growth in more than 15 years, and the stock that looked finished a year ago has roughly tripled in 2026.*\n\nIntel reported second-quarter revenue of $16.1 billion on July 23, up 25% from a year earlier and $1.8 billion above the midpoint of its own guidance. That is the company's strongest growth in more than 15 years, according to Intel's earnings release. Fifteen years. The business that carried it was Data Center and AI, where revenue jumped 59% to $6.3 billion as cloud customers kept buying CPUs for AI infrastructure.\n\nThe bottom line moved even faster than the top line. Intel swung from an adjusted loss a year earlier to non-GAAP earnings of 42 cents a share, double the 21 cents analysts expected, according to Investing.com's earnings transcript coverage. Gross margin rebounded to 41.8%. CFO Dave Zinsner said in Intel's release that the company beat guidance on strong demand and better execution, including higher factory yields and improved cycle times. That matters more than a clean EPS beat. It says the factories did some of the work.\n\nShares rose 5.2% in after-hours trading after the report, Reuters reported, though other market trackers showed a sharper early spike that faded. The stock was already up roughly 163% for the year heading into the print, according to Money365, and Reuters had noted in June that Intel had gained about threefold for 2026 after President Donald Trump claimed Apple would work with the company on U.S. chip production. Intel had no such luxury a year ago. Back then, investors were still treating the foundry plan as an expensive promise with no obvious customer base.\n\nYou don't get numbers like that from cost-cutting alone. Client Computing and Physical AI revenue rose 13% to $8.9 billion. Intel guided third-quarter revenue to $15.8 billion to $16.8 billion, above the $15.1 billion analysts expected, according to Reuters. Management also lifted 2026 capital spending to more than $20 billion from earlier plans, a blunt sign that Intel thinks the demand is real enough to spend into.\n\n## The foundry proof is still uneven\n\nFor years, Intel's foundry business was the punchline of every semiconductor story. Years behind TSMC. Bleeding billions. Still hunting for outside customers willing to bet real silicon on Intel's manufacturing. The picture is better now, but you need to keep the scale straight. Data Center Dynamics reported that Intel Foundry revenue rose 31% to $5.8 billion in the quarter, while external foundry revenue was still only $293 million and the unit lost $2.1 billion.\n\nThe strongest technical data point came before earnings. ASML said on July 15 that Intel Foundry had entered high-volume manufacturing for a subset of Core Ultra Series 3 Panther Lake processors using High NA EUV on Intel 18A. Specific 18A layers are dual-qualified in Oregon, and product is shipping to customers at yields matched to ASML's current NXE platform. TechTimes, citing KeyBanc Capital Markets, reported that Intel's 18A yield had reached roughly 85%. This is foundry credibility. It isn't foundry dominance.\n\nThen came Apple, or at least the version of Apple that has been reported so far. The Wall Street Journal reported in May, as summarized by Macworld and MacRumors, that Apple and Intel had reached a preliminary agreement for Intel to manufacture some Apple-designed chips. Reuters later reported that Trump said Apple had agreed to work with Intel to design and manufacture chips in the United States. Apple and Intel did not confirm the arrangement to Reuters. Keep that sentence in your head, because it's the difference between a verified supply deal and a politically useful headline.\n\nThe likely shape of the deal is narrower than the rally suggests. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has pointed to Intel handling lower-end Apple silicon, not the flagship processors that define the iPhone or the highest-end Macs, and The Information reported that the chips could be for lower-end laptops and iPads. TSMC still owns the relationship that matters most. Intel getting any Apple work would still be a reputational win, but nobody should mistake it for Apple handing over the crown jewels.\n\n## The bet is execution now\n\nThat's the real story here. Intel isn't winning because it suddenly out-engineered TSMC. It's winning because CEO Lip-Bu Tan, who became chief executive in March 2025, has put hard numbers under a turnaround that used to run mostly on patience. Revenue beat. Margin beat. Factory cycles improved. Panther Lake is shipping with High NA EUV on some layers. That is a different conversation from the one Intel was having eighteen months ago.\n\nIt still might not work. Foundry customers don't switch overnight, and Intel's 85% yield marker still trails the roughly 90% level analysts often assign to TSMC's N2 ramp. Apple's reported commitment is a toe in the water. Fortinet, Intel's first named external foundry customer announced in July, is using Intel 4 for a security processor, not 18A for a leading-edge AI chip. Those are not small caveats. They are the business.\n\nFrankly, the skeptics were betting on Intel staying broken. The quarter says that was too easy. The stock has already priced in a lot of repair, and Intel now has to prove that stronger yields, AI CPU demand and outside foundry interest can survive more than one excellent report.\n\n**Also read:** [LemonLime Offered Job Interviews for Tattoos, Then the Founder Apologized](https://startupfortune.com/lemonlime-offered-job-interviews-for-tattoos-then-the-founder-apologized/) • [Reddit's Stock Sinks After Earnings as Google's AI Overviews Eat Its Traffic](https://startupfortune.com/reddits-stock-sinks-after-earnings-as-googles-ai-overviews-eat-its-traffic/) • [Applied Materials jumped 15% on July 30 without saying a word](https://startupfortune.com/applied-materials-jumped-15-on-july-30-without-saying-a-word/)", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade", "canonical_source": "https://startupfortune.com/intels-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade/", "published_at": "2026-08-01 03:45:42+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-01 03:53:27.067226+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-chips"], "entities": ["Intel", "Apple", "ASML", "Ming-Chi Kuo", "KeyBanc Capital Markets", "Reuters", "The Wall Street Journal", "The Information"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/intel-s-stock-is-up-170-in-2026-after-its-best-quarter-in-over-a-decade.jsonld"}}