Intel’s The latest earnings reports showed strong demand for central processing units (CPUs) as companies rush to build out artificial intelligence capabilities, sending stocks soaring. The numbers prompted investors to scoop up shares in another large semiconductor maker. advanced micro device.
AMD stock soared more than 12% on Friday as Wall Street analysts were caught off guard by Intel’s CPU performance. They believe this performance will spread to other major CPU manufacturers.
“We thought CPU would be the next big bottleneck, but Intel’s results show it’s already turning into a very large upside,” DA Davidson analyst Gil Luria said in a note Friday. “CPUs are re-establishing themselves as essential foundations of the AI era, and the once-sluggish CPU market is starting to take off as agent workloads shift their computing needs and move beyond graphics processing units manufactured by companies like Nvidia.”
Luria upgraded AMD from neutral to buyout and raised sales and gross profit margins for 2026. He also raised his price target on the stock to $375, implying a 22% upside from Thursday’s closing price.
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This comes after Intel released stronger-than-expected guidance for the second quarter. Other analysts on the street noted the CPU spike as well.
“Intel now expects server CPU units to grow by double digits in 2026, which is higher than the modest growth expected six months ago,” Citi analyst Atif Malik said on Friday. He upgraded Intel stock from Neutral to Buy.
Wall Street sees the Intel news as CPU makers and data center equipment providers growing as a group, with AMD at the center.
“Based on signs of increased participation in AI infrastructure’s high growth, we are significantly increasing our price target for INTC to bring it in line with the company’s AI infrastructure peers AMD, MRVL, CRDO, and ALAB (all rated Buy),” Roth’s Suzi DeSilva wrote on Friday.
Meanwhile, Barclays’ Tom O’Malley doubted Intel would lose market share to rival AMD.
“Our downside case of $40 is based on our downside CY27 PF EPS of 47 times $0.85, which assumes a larger stock price loss to AMD,” he said, citing other factors as well. Intel was trading around $81 early Friday.
