Intel stock falls 45% in October as its foundry plan faces pressure
Intel has no large external customer for its newest processors, and it moves factory capacity away from them.
In October 2026, Intel said that its data center revenue rose 78% and its PC revenue fell 5%. Intel says that memory shortages caused the PC fall.
Earlier: Intel data center revenue increased 78% while PC revenue fell 5%
Intel shares fell 45% in October, the biggest fall in a month on record, FactSet data shows. The processor maker said that its revenue this quarter will be $1 billion to $2 billion below the estimates of analysts, because the PC market is weak. The foundry business, which makes processors for other companies, must win a large customer. Intel did not give a comment.
How it works
Intel spent part of $108 billion in capital expenditure in five years to challenge TSMC, the Taiwan processor maker. Intel makes mostly its own processors. Because of a capacity shortage, it moves some factory capacity in Oregon from its newest 18A processors to an older node, Intel 3, for data center processors.
The numbers
- The shares fell 29% in one day, the worst day since the 1970s.
- Data center revenue rose 78% to $7.3 billion in the third quarter.
- PCs give about half of Intel revenue.
What is not known
The chief executive Lip-Bu Tan says that Intel will name “a couple of customers” in the next two quarters. He gave no names. David Yoffie, a Harvard professor who was on the Intel board before, says that Intel needs a large customer in less than one year, or its finances will suffer more. He says that the best solution is to divide the foundry from Intel.
Insight: Intel serves its own processors first, and that costs it foundry customers
Lip-Bu Tan says that supply, not need, limits the data center business. Intel moves capacity from 18A to Intel 3 for its own data center processors. David Yoffie says that buyers are not sure of a supplier with no spare capacity. This seems to trade a future as a supplier for sales in the short term, and a rival processor maker can also distrust a foundry that competes with it. Monitor the customer names due in two quarters.
Sources
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