Intel shares plunge about 21% after hours as weak fourth-quarter outlook overshadows $16.5 billion Q3 beat
Intel beat Q3 forecasts with $16.5 billion revenue but guided Q4 sales down to $15–16 billion, and its shares fell about 21% after hours.
At a glance
- Intel's third-quarter 2026 revenue rose 21% to $16.5 billion, and adjusted earnings of 52 cents a share beat the roughly 40 cents expected.
- The company forecast fourth-quarter revenue of $15 billion to $16 billion and adjusted earnings of 25 cents a share, well below the quarter just ended.
- Shares fell about 21% in after-hours trading to around $72, from a regular-session close of $92.07.
- Intel Foundry lost $1.9 billion on $6.7 billion of revenue, its eleventh quarterly loss in a row, though the loss narrowed by $236 million.
- Intel blamed supply limits, a factory disruption in Israel and a PC slowdown it expects to last at least through the first half of 2027.
Intel shares lost about a fifth of their value in after-hours trading on Thursday, October 29, 2026. The chipmaker beat forecasts for the third quarter but said sales and profit would fall in the last three months of the year. The stock dropped roughly 21% to about $72.40, from a regular-session close of $92.07. That wiped out most of the 10% rally of the past week and put Intel on course for one of its worst days in decades.
The quarter was good. Revenue rose 21% from a year earlier to $16.5 billion. Adjusted earnings came to 52 cents a share, against about 40 cents forecast. The problem was the guidance.
A strong quarter, then a step down
| Q3 2026 (actual) | Q4 2026 (Intel forecast) | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $16.5bn (+21% year on year) | $15.0bn–$16.0bn |
| Adjusted EPS | $0.52 | $0.25 |
| EPS under standard accounting (GAAP) | — | $0.10 |
| Analysts' Q3 forecasts | about $16.54bn revenue, $0.40 EPS | — |
Revenue was a hair below the consensus, by about $24 million. Investors could have looked past that. They could not look past a forecast that roughly halves adjusted profit per share from one quarter to the next.
Why Intel expects a weaker fourth quarter
Executives gave three reasons on the call with analysts:
- Not enough supply. Demand for Intel's Xeon server processors is strong as companies build AI data centres, and the data-centre business had a record quarter. Intel says it simply cannot make enough of them. "Our immediate priority is to unlock additional supply to meet extraordinary demand for our Xeon family," chief executive Lip-Bu Tan said.
- A factory problem in Israel. A disruption at one of its plants there will cut output this quarter. Intel has several fabs in Israel, including its big site at Kiryat Gat.
- A PC slowdown. The finance chief said the softness in personal computer sales would continue at least through the first half of next year, which hits Intel's biggest business, PC chips.
The foundry is still losing money
Intel Foundry, the contract manufacturing arm that Tan's turnaround depends on, had revenue of $6.7 billion and an operating loss of $1.9 billion. The loss was $236 million smaller than in the previous quarter. It was still the eleventh losing quarter in a row.
Revenue from outside customers, the real test of the foundry plan, was just $411 million, and Intel said much of that came from a one-off customer programme. On technology, the company said it released version 0.9 of the design kit for its next manufacturing process, Intel 14A, to potential customers in October. Companies use that kit to start designing chips for the process.
How the stock got here
Intel shares had climbed strongly in 2026 on hopes that the turnaround under Tan, who took over in March 2025, was working. Investment from the US government, Nvidia and SoftBank helped. In August the company also raised about $20 billion through a share sale to pay for new factories. Thursday's fall shows how much of that hope was already in the price.
It was a rough night for chip and tech shares in general. Alphabet had already fallen about 12% during the day over its AI spending. Amazon slipped after hours on its own results, and Reddit, Roblox and Twilio each dropped more than 15% in late trading.
What it means for buyers and the chip market
For people buying laptops and desktops, Intel's supply squeeze is mostly about server chips. PC processors are not expected to run short. But a weaker PC market and tight server supply could keep prices firm for business machines into early 2027. Pakistan and the rest of South Asia import nearly all their PCs and servers, so any global price rise reaches local shops within weeks.
Intel will report fourth-quarter results in late January 2027. Before then, investors will watch for news on fixing the Israel disruption and for any big outside customer signing up for the 14A process.
