Intel's second-quarter revenue beats expectations, shares rise more than 10% after hours
Intel announced its financial report for the second quarter of 2026. Revenue for the quarter reached US$16.13 billion, a significant increase of 25% year-on-year, exceeding market expectations and setting the strongest single-quarter growth rate in the past 15 years. Driven by the explosive demand for AI computing power, data center and artificial intelligence business revenue soared 59% year-on-year to US$6.3 billion, becoming the core engine driving performance growth; customer computing and foundry businesses also achieved year-on-year growth of 13% and 31% respectively.
Intel announced its financial report for the second quarter of 2026. Revenue for the quarter reached US$16.13 billion, a significant increase of 25% year-on-year, exceeding market expectations and setting the strongest single-quarter growth rate in the past 15 years. Driven by the explosive demand for AI computing power, data center and artificial intelligence business revenue soared 59% year-on-year to US$6.3 billion, becoming the core engine driving performance growth; customer computing and foundry businesses also achieved year-on-year growth of 13% and 31% respectively. Regarding its third-quarter results, Intel gave revenue guidance of US$15.8 billion to US$16.8 billion, with a median of US$16.3 billion, exceeding Wall Street's previous forecast of US$15.06 billion. This shows that management is optimistic about demand in the second half of the year. Management stated that the substantial increase in shipments brought about by the improvement of factory yields and the shortening of production cycles is an important support for the significant improvement in performance. Buoyed by strong performance and better-than-expected guidance, Intel's stock price once rose by more than 10% in after-hours trading on U.S. stocks. Despite the short-term revenue breakthrough, Intel's long-term valuation reconstruction still faces multiple tests. In the future, investors will focus on gross profit margin improvement, cash flow status, AI chip competitiveness and the input-output ratio of Intel Foundry's foundry business.