Intel Corporation’s (INTC) shares plunged nearly 31% in April, marking their worst month in more than two decades, as the prominent chipmaker continues to grapple with executing a turnaround. Moreover, the stock has dropped approximately 40% year-to-date.
Most of INTC’s sell-off occurred after its recent financial results, which included a bleak forecast, indicating that the company’s turnaround efforts will require more time and investment. Further, Intel’s factory operations faced challenges in March, adding to investor concerns.
Mixed First-Quarter Earnings and Weak Forecast
During the first quarter that ended March 30, 2024, INTC’s net revenue increased 8.6% year-over-year to $12.72 billion. However, that missed analysts’ estimate of $12.78 billion. Also, the company’s Foundry business reported $4.40 billion in revenue, down 10% year-over-year.
The chipmaker’s gross margin rose 30.2% from the prior year’s quarter to $5.22 billion. Its operating loss was $1.07 billion, compared to $1.47 billion in the previous year’s period. However, Intel Foundry posted a $2.50 billion operating loss during the quarter. In 2023, this unit reported a hefty operating loss of $7 billion.
Furthermore, INTC’s net income came in at $437 million versus $2.77 billion in the same quarter of 2023. Also, the loss per share attributable to Intel was $0.09, compared to $0.66 in the prior year’s quarter. That surpassed the consensus loss per share estimate of $0.15.
Intel’s primary business remains manufacturing chips for PCs and laptops, categorized as Client Computing Group (CCG). This business unit revenue amounted to $7.50 billion, a 31% increase year-over-year.
In addition, Intel produces central processors for servers and other components and software, which are classified under its Data Center and AI business segment. Sales in this segment rose by 5% year-over-year to $3 billion. However, the chipmaker faces stiff competition in the server market, particularly against AI chips from companies like NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA).
In addition, for the second quarter of fiscal 2024, the company expects its revenue to come between $12.5 billion and $13.5 billion. It projects a loss per share of $0.05 for the current quarter, and its non-GAAP earnings per share are expected to be $0.10.
INTC recently revised its current-quarter revenue guidance after the U.S. Department of Commerce revoked certain export licenses intended to send its chips to the Chinese tech company Huawei.
On May 7, the chipmaker said in an 8-K filing with the SEC that it had received a notification from federal regulators that they were “revoking certain licenses for exports of consumer-related items to a customer in China, effective immediately.”
On Wednesday, Intel announced that due to the Commerce Department’s directive, it expects revenue for the second quarter to fall below the midpoint of the original range of $12.5 billion to $13.5 billion. However, the company continues to expect full-year revenue and earnings to be higher than in 2023.
Intel Faces Fierce Competition
INTC, a longstanding leader in the semiconductor industry, has been facing rigid competition from rivals, including Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD) and Nvidia. Intel remains dominant in the PC chip market, but AMD is gaining ground in server, desktop, and mobile segments, as per the latest figures from Mercury Research.
Intel remains the leading player in the server CPU segment, with a market share of 79.2% during the first quarter; however, this is down from 82% in the year-ago quarter, indicating some erosion in its market share. On the other hand, AMD made gains in this segment, rising from just 18% a year ago to 23.6% in the first quarter of 2024.
Also, Intel’s market share in the mobile CPU segment was 80.7% in the first quarter of 2024, compared to 83.8% in the prior year’s quarter. However, AMD’s 19.3% market share in the first quarter was 3.1% up from the same period in 2023. Further, AMD gained on Intel, with its 23.9% desktop share in the fiscal 2024 first quarter, up 4.7% a year ago.
Besides, INTC continues to fight for server market share against competitor NVDA, particularly in AI chips. Nvidia commands around 80% of the AI chip market with its graphics processors (GPUs), which AI builders have favored over the past year.
Earlier in April, Intel introduced its latest AI chip, Gaudi 3, as competition from NVDA intensified. The company claimed the new Gaudi 3 chip is over twice as power-efficient and can run AI models 1.5 times faster than Nvidia’s H100 GPU. Also, it is available in various configurations, such as a bundle of eight Gaudi 3 chips on a single motherboard or a card designed to fit into existing systems.
Intel tested the chip on models like Meta’s open-source Llama and Falcon, backed by Abu Dhabi. It highlighted that Gaudi 3 could be instrumental in training or deploying models, including Stable Diffusion and OpenAI’s Whisper model for speech recognition.
Also, Intel is losing market share to rivals such as Arm Holdings PLC (ARM), Samsung Electronics, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Ltd. (TSM).
Analysts Lowered Price Targets for Intel Shares
Goldman Sachs analysts slashed their price target for INTC stock from $39 to $34 and lowered their adjusted EPS estimates for the 2024-2026 period by an average of 18%. Also, they reaffirmed their “Sell” rating for the stock, which has been in effect since July 2020.
“We worry the company will continue to cede wallet share within the overall Data Center Compute market to the likes of Nvidia and Arm,” Goldman analysts said.
Meanwhile, Bank of America Corporation (BAC) cut its price objective to $40 from $44, citing higher costs, lower growth, and fierce competition. According to BofA analysts, the bleak second-quarter revenue guidance highlights that “topline growth remains lukewarm on limited AI exposure, while underutilized manufacturing and elevated costs.”
They added that Intel’s “enterprise incumbency, US-based manufacturing assets and weak investor sentiment provide turnaround potential.”
Bottom Line
INTC’s first-quarter 2024 earnings surpassed Wall Street’s expectations for EPS but fell short on sales. The chipmaker also provided a weak forecast for the current quarter.
After the U.S. Department of Commerce recently revoked certain licenses for exports of chips to Huawei in a bid to curb China’s tech power, Intel revised its second-quarter revenue guidance, anticipating below the initial range of $12.5 billion to $13.5 billion.
INTC’s stock fell more than 30% in April, making its biggest decline since June 2002. Moreover, the stock is trading below its 50-day and 200-day moving averages of $38.33 and $39.74, respectively, indicating a downtrend.
Despite INTC’s more than 50 years of dominance in the semiconductor industry, it now faces intense competition from competitors like AMD, NVDA, TSM, Samsung, ARM, and more. Also, the ongoing AI boom has caused a shift in enterprise spending away from Intel’s traditional data center chips.
With limited AI exposure, the intensifying competition raises doubts about Intel’s future dominance in the semiconductor industry.
INTC’s CEO Pat Gelsinger told investors on an earnings call to focus on the company’s long-term potential.
Analysts expect INTC’s revenue to increase marginally year-over-year to $13.06 billion for the second quarter ending June 2024. However, its EPS for the current quarter is expected to decline 18.2% year-over-year to $0.11. For the fiscal year 2024, the chipmaker’s revenue and EPS are expected to grow 3.3% and 4.8% year-over-year to $55.99 billion and $1.10, respectively.
“While 2024 should mark a bottom in many aspects of the business, the pace of the climb back up is unlikely to remain unclear,” Stifel stated in a note to clients.
Given INTC’s disappointing revenue guidance, regulatory issues, and fierce competition, it could be wise to avoid investing in this stock now.
