Intel's stock price plummeted by as much as 30% on October 30, wiping out over $137 billion in market capitalization. The company's third-quarter revenue increased by 21% year-over-year to $16.5 billion, but it projects fourth-quarter revenue of only $15 billion to $16 billion, below market expectations of $17.07 billion. A key reason for this downward guidance is the tight storage supply resulting from the expansion of the AI industry: storage manufacturers are shifting more capacity to high-bandwidth memory (HBM) required for AI servers, driving up traditional DRAM prices, increasing overall PC costs, and suppressing procurement demand. Intel expects fourth-quarter client business revenue to decline by more than 20% sequentially, and global PC shipments to decline by approximately 12% by 2026. Meanwhile, while the company's data center and AI business revenue increased by 78% year-over-year, server CPU demand exceeds existing supply, and insufficient manufacturing capacity makes it difficult to fully fulfill orders. AI investment is driving server chip demand on one hand, but impacting the traditional PC market through rising memory prices on the other, leaving Intel facing pressure from both ends.
