Intel Loses $3.7 Billion and Wall Street is Thrilled

If there’s a company that needed some good news, it’s Intel. And it somehow got some this past quarter with earnings that beat estimates for the first time in quite a while. Granted, it still posted a loss. A massive loss.

Intel reported that it delivered a net loss of $3.7 billion on revenues of $13.6 billion in the quarter ending March 28, 2026. Revenues were up 7 percent year-over-year (YOY) and Intel stock jumped 20 percent despite the loss because Intel provided a better-than-expected sales forecast for the current quarter.

“With a solid foundation in place, we are addressing the opportunity by listening to our customers and driving their success with our technical expertise and differentiated IP,” Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said. “This deliberate reset to how we operate drove a sixth consecutive quarter of revenue above our expectations, as well as new and deepened relationships with strategic partners.”

It’s unclear why Wall Street is so excited by these results: Analysts expected the company to deliver a $2.5 billion profit in the quarter, so Intel was off by about $6.2 billion on that count. But much of that loss was tied to one-time charges related to Intel’s 78 percent stake in Mobileye and, wait for it, payments associated with the U.S. government’s 10 percent stake in the company.

As for the actual business, Intel’s Client Computing Group, which makes chips for PCs, reported revenues of $7.7 billion, up 1 percent YOY. Its Data Center and AI business posted revenues of $5.1 billion, up 22 percent YOY. And Intel Foundry, which is reported as a standalone business, delivered $5.4 billion in revenues, up 16 percent YOY.

Intel expects to report revenues of $13.8 billion to $14.8 billion in the current quarter, a nice increase over the $13 billion analysts expected. Thus, the irrational exuberance.