While AMD (AMD) brought out new leaks about the Ryzen processor, chip stock Intel (INTC) got leaks of its own with the so-called “Arrow Lake Refresh” line. The new processors have some noteworthy characteristics, but not all the news is positive. Intel lost ground in the process, with shares slipping modestly in Tuesday afternoon’s trading.
Elevate Your Investing Strategy:
- Take advantage of TipRanks Premium at 50% off! Unlock powerful investing tools, advanced data, and expert analyst insights to help you invest with confidence.
The Arrow Lake Refresh line is likely to have some improvements to it, though perhaps not as many as some might have hoped. One entry on Geekbench, reports note, features a Core Ultra 300 series family processor with eight P-cores and 12 E-cores. A v6 single-core test result featured a processor that achieved 2,140 points in testing, while the multicore version produced 19,744 points.
The bad news, however, is that the benchmark test actually shows a score that is lower than average for the current Core Ultra 7 165K line, and by a healthy margin. The last such test produced a score of 3,030 for single-core and 20,861 for multicore. That might seem like bad news, but there is a ray of hope: the lower score is likely due to the use of an engineering sample rather than a production model, and the use of software that is not fully using the processor.
Even Split
Meanwhile, another commentator weighed in about the recent Trump deal, which featured American taxpayers actually getting something for their grant money. This particular comment suggested that Americans should receive those shares directly.
The commentator went on to declare that the IRS should set up an investment account—to which some wonder, is that not what Social Security basically is, or was supposed to be?—into which the shares should be distributed. Any dividends in the shares—because not all shares pay dividends—should be sent back to the account, and taxpayers would be able to sell their shares to pay income tax or serve as a refund.
Is Intel a Buy, Hold or Sell?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Hold consensus rating on INTC stock based on one Buy, 26 Holds and three Sells assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 21.14% rally in its share price over the past year, the average INTC price target of $22.34 per share implies 7.15% downside risk.
