Intel (INTC) Risk Analysis

In recent years, we have not made repurchases of our stock and reduced, and then suspended in the fourth quarter of 2024, our quarterly dividend. Further, we agreed under our commercial CHIPS Act agreement to forgo paying dividends for the next two years, and agreed to limitations on the payment of dividends for the three years thereafter. There can be no assurance that we will be able to pay dividends in the future. In addition, we are not obligated to make repurchases under our stock repurchase program and there can be no assurances as to the amount, timing, and execution of any future share repurchases, or that any repurchases will enhance long-term stockholder value.

A number of factors can impact our future effective tax rate or cash payments, which could cause significant variability in our financial results, including: ?changes in the volume and mix of profits earned and location of assets across jurisdictions with varying tax rates; ?changes in our business or legal entity operating model; ?the resolution of issues arising from tax audits, including payment of interest and penalties; ?changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities, and in deferred tax valuation allowances; ?adjustments to estimated taxes upon finalization of tax returns; ?increases in expenses not deductible for tax purposes, including impairments of goodwill; ?changes in available tax credits, including non-US tax credits, R&D credits, and refundable tax credits; ?expirations or changes in our ability to secure new tax holidays and incentives; ?changes in US federal, state, or foreign tax laws or their interpretation, including the global implementation of a minimum tax under Pillar Two of the OECD BEPS initiative; ?changes in US GAAP and non-US IFRS; and ?our decision to repatriate non-US earnings for which we have not previously provided for incremental taxes, including any local country withholding taxes incurred upon repatriation.

The design, manufacturing, assembly, and test of our products require the use and purchase of materials and chemicals that are subject to a broad array of environmental, health, and safety laws and regulations. Our operations and those of our suppliers are further governed by regulations prohibiting the use of forced labor (e.g., mining conflict minerals), and restrictions on other materials, as well as laws or regulations governing the operation of our facilities, sale and distribution of our products, and use of our real property. The scope and interpretation of such laws and regulations, including the materials they govern, are complex and continue to evolve. The procedures and processes in place under our compliance program may become onerous or increasingly expensive to maintain and cannot guarantee compliance by employees or third parties to whom such laws apply. The amendment or expansion of these laws or regulations, as well as our failure or inability to comply with them (including as a result of acquired entities), can result in regulatory penalties, fines, and legal liabilities; increased costs; additional remediation obligations; suspension of production; alteration, suspension, or termination of our manufacturing and assembly and test processes, including due to an inability to find, afford, or attain adequate substitute materials, equipment, or processes; damage to our reputation; and restrictions on our operations or sales. In addition, the failure or inability to comply by our suppliers of these materials can require us to suspend or alter our production processes and sources, and result in increased risks and costs. The failure or inability by us, our customers, or our suppliers to manage the use, transportation, emissions, discharge, storage, recycling, or disposal of hazardous materials can lead to increased costs or future liabilities. Environmental regulations, including with respect to the materials and processes we are permitted to use and as to air quality and wastewater requirements, may impede our ability to manufacture products or expand or modify our manufacturing capability in the future. Environmental laws and regulations sometimes require us to acquire additional pollution abatement or remediation equipment, modify product designs, cease the use of a particular material or process, remove or remediate hazardous substances, or incur other expenses or liabilities. Regulations in response to climate change could result in increased manufacturing costs associated with air pollution requirements. For example, semiconductor manufacturing uses perfluorocarbons, which have historically made up a large portion of our direct greenhouse gas emissions. New or increased regulations limiting the use of such compounds, or other greenhouse gas emissions, could require us to install additional abatement equipment, purchase carbon offsets, and/or alter, where feasible, our production processes and sources. In addition, new or increased climate change regulation could increase our energy costs, for example as a result of carbon pricing impacts on electrical utilities. Regulations in response to human health concerns may also limit or prohibit the use of a class of chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which are found in parts, components, process chemicals, and other materials used in semiconductor manufacturing. Such chemicals are critical to the manufacturing and functioning of many semiconductor products and there are limited technically and commercially feasible alternatives. As we expand our manufacturing capacity, the impacts of future regulation could be magnified. Many new materials that we are evaluating for use in our operations are also subject to regulation under environmental laws. These restrictions could harm our business and results of operations by increasing our expenses or requiring us to alter manufacturing and assembly and test processes.

From time to time, we identify product defects, errata, and other product issues, which can result from problems in our product design or our manufacturing and assembly and test processes. Components and products we purchase or license from third-party suppliers, or gain through acquisitions, can also contain defects. Product issues also sometimes result from the interaction between our products and third-party products and software. We face risks if products that we design, manufacture, or sell, or that include our technology, cause personal injury or property damage, even where the cause is unrelated to product defects or errata. These risks may increase as our products are introduced into new devices, market segments, technologies, or applications, including transportation, autonomous driving, healthcare, communications, financial services, and other industrial, critical infrastructure, and consumer uses. Costs from defects, errata, or other product issues could include: ?writing off some or all of the value of inventory; ?recalling products that have been shipped; ?providing product replacements or modifications; ?providing consideration to customers, including reimbursement for certain costs they incur; ?defending against litigation and/or paying resulting damages; ?paying fines imposed by regulatory agencies; and ?reputational harm. These costs could be large and may increase expenses and lower gross margin, and/or result in delay or loss of revenue. Mitigation techniques designed to address product issues, including software and firmware updates, are not always available on a timely basis—or at all—and do not always operate as intended or effectively resolve such issues for all applications. We and third parties, such as hardware and software vendors, make prioritization decisions about which product issues to address, which can delay, limit, or prevent development or deployment of a mitigation and harm our reputation and result in costs. Product defects, errata, or other product issues and/or mitigation techniques can result in product failures, adverse performance and power effects, reboots, system instability or unavailability, loss of functionality, data loss or corruption, unpredictable system behavior, decisions by customers and end users to limit or change the applications in which they use our products or product features, and other issues. For example, during 2024, some of our customers experienced instability issues when using Intel Core 13th and 14th Gen desktop processors, which required us to undertake an investigation and deploy corrective actions. This adversely impacted sales volume during 2024 and may result in higher warranty costs in the future. Product issues can damage our reputation, negatively affect product demand, delay product releases or deployment, result in legal liability, or make our products less competitive, which could harm our business and financial results. Subsequent events or new information can develop that change our assessment of the impact of a product issue. In addition, our liability insurance coverage has certain exclusions or may not adequately cover liabilities incurred. Our insurance providers may be unable or unwilling to pay a claim, and losses not covered by insurance could be large, which could harm our financial condition.

We believe that hiring and retaining qualified executives, scientists, engineers, technical talent, sales representatives, and other professionals are critical to our business. The competition for highly skilled employees in our industry is intense, with the demand often exceeding supply. Competitors for technical talent often seek to hire our employees, and the availability of flexible, hybrid, or work-from-home arrangements has both intensified and expanded competition. In addition, changes in immigration policies may further limit the pool of available talent and impair our ability to recruit and hire technical and professional talent. From time to time, we have intensified our efforts to recruit and retain talent, such as during 2021 and the first half of 2022, and these efforts have increased our expenses. Further, we may not be successful in attracting, retaining, and motivating the workforce necessary to deliver on our strategy, and we have been required to curtail our planned hiring and reduce our workforce to respond to business conditions that have differed from our expectations, which can be disruptive, adversely impact employee morale, compromise our ability to deliver on our strategy and workforce goals, and impact our ability to recruit in the future. For example, we undertook significant headcount reductions in 2022 and 2024. To help attract, retain, and motivate qualified employees, we use share-based awards, such as RSUs, and performance-based cash incentive awards. Sustained declines in our stock price or lower stock price performance relative to our competitors have reduced the retention value of our share-based awards, which can impact the competitiveness of our compensation. To the extent our compensation programs and workplace culture are not viewed as competitive, or changes in our workforce and related restructuring, reduction-in-force, or other initiatives are not viewed favorably, our ability to attract, retain, and motivate employees can be weakened, which could harm our results of operations. In addition, significant or prolonged turnover may negatively impact our operations and culture, as well as our ability to successfully maintain our processes and procedures, including due to the loss of historical, technical, and other expertise. Changes in our management team can also disrupt our business and adversely affect our results of operations, given the long development cycle for semiconductor process technologies and products and the large capital investments over a long time period required for semiconductor manufacturing operations. We have had a number of changes in our senior leadership team in recent years, including our CEO and other senior management positions. For example, in December 2024, our most recent CEO retired after less than four years with the company and a search is currently underway for a new CEO. To the extent we do not effectively hire, onboard, retain, and motivate key employees and leadership, our business may be harmed.

We have manufacturing, assembly and test, R&D, sales, and other operations in many countries, and some of our business activities are concentrated in one or more geographic areas. Our operations rely upon a supply chain that is also highly distributed, and with reliance in some instances on supplies or materials available in only one or more geographic areas. Moreover, sales outside the US accounted for 76% of our revenue for the fiscal year ended December 28, 2024, with revenue from billings to China contributing 29% of our total revenue. As a result, our operations and our financial results, including our ability to execute our business strategy, manufacture, assemble and test, design, develop, or sell products, and the demand for our products, are at times adversely affected by a number of global and regional factors outside of our control. Adverse changes in global or regional economic conditions periodically occur, including recession or slowing growth; changes or uncertainty in fiscal, monetary, or trade policy; high interest rates; tighter credit; inflation; lower capital expenditures by businesses, including on IT infrastructure; increases in unemployment; and lower consumer confidence and spending. Adverse changes in macroeconomic conditions can significantly harm demand for our products and make it more challenging to forecast our operating results and make business decisions, including regarding prioritization of investments in our business. An economic downturn or increased uncertainty may also lead to: increased credit and collectability risks; higher borrowing costs or reduced availability of capital and credit markets; reduced liquidity; adverse impacts on our suppliers; failures of counterparties, including financial institutions and insurers; asset impairments; and declines in the value of our financial instruments. Trade policies and disputes at times result in increased tariffs, trade barriers, and other trade restrictions and protectionist measures, which can increase our manufacturing costs, make our products less competitive, reduce demand for our products, limit our ability to sell to certain customers, limit our ability to procure components or raw materials, or impede or slow the movement of our goods across borders. Increasing protectionism and economic nationalism may lead to further changes in trade policies and regulations, domestic sourcing initiatives, or other formal and informal measures that could make it more difficult to sell our products in, or restrict our access to, some markets. They can also result in declining consumer confidence and slowing economic growth or recession, and could cause our customers to reduce, cancel, or alter the timing of their purchases with us. Sustained geopolitical tensions could lead to long-term changes in global trade and technology supply chains, domestic sourcing initiatives, and decoupling of global trade networks, which could make it more difficult to sell our products in, or restrict our access to, some markets and have a material adverse effect on our business and growth prospects. In particular, geopolitical and trade tensions between the US and China, one of our largest markets, have led to increased tariffs and trade restrictions, including tariffs applicable to some of our products, and have affected customer ordering patterns. Further, the US has imposed restrictions on the export of US-regulated products and technology to certain Chinese technology companies, including certain of our customers. Specifically, in 2022 the US significantly increased US export controls on semiconductor manufacturing equipment and on AI and advanced computing products. In 2023, the US added to the restrictions in all three areas and also worked with Japan and the Netherlands to align on additional restrictions on semiconductor manufacturing equipment. In 2024, the US Commerce Department further expanded export controls to limit the global distribution of high-performance integrated circuits by restricting sales through customer allocations and imposing per-country caps. During this time, the US has increasingly added Chinese companies to prohibited lists. In response, China has restricted US access to certain minerals and has blocked certain companies that provide products to Taiwan's military from selling products in China. These restrictions have in some instances reduced our sales and in a number of instances required specific governmental authorizations or exceptions. These and potential future restrictions, including also through application of antitrust laws and restrictions based on cybersecurity and other national security concerns, could adversely affect our financial performance and result in reputational harm to us. In addition, a number of semiconductor companies in China, including SMIC, are making significant investments, in many instances with the support of the Chinese government, in advanced semiconductor technologies to enable such companies to develop products and technologies that compete with ours. It is difficult to predict what further trade-related actions governments may take, whether the 2025 change in US administration may heighten tensions, the extent to which we may be able to mitigate the effects of any trade-related actions, and the longer-term implications of trade-related actions on the market opportunities for us and the competition we may face. Geopolitical and security issues, such as armed conflict and civil or military unrest, political instability, human rights concerns, and terrorist activity, present significant risks to our global operations. For example: ?There has been a significant escalation in tensions and hostilities affecting or in close proximity to Israel, where we have a leading-edge fabrication facility and multiple product development centers. As a significant portion of our revenues are generated from products on Intel 7 manufactured at our fabrication facility in Israel and we are not insured for business interruptions, a disruption of that facility could have a significant adverse impact on our business. Additionally, our property, plant, and equipment assets in Israel are self-insured and could be impacted by the conflict. Further, our Mobileye business is headquartered and has most of its operations in Israel and could be similarly impacted. ?Tensions between mainland China and Taiwan have increased significantly in recent years, presenting an elevated risk of hostilities. Many of our products and all of our more advanced products depend on suppliers in Taiwan for critical components, including various compute die, that cannot be easily or quickly replaced. Other of our products, including some of our most recently introduced products, are made entirely in Taiwan. As such, any disruption impacting Taiwan could significantly and adversely impact our ability to obtain critical components and supply our customers with products. ?Russia’s ongoing conflict with Ukraine has resulted in the imposition of financial and other sanctions and export controls against Russia and Belarus that has caused us and other companies to limit or suspend Russian operations (we had no exports to Russia in 2023 and 2024). The conflict has also resulted in Russia-imposed currency restrictions and regulations and other retaliatory trade and other actions, increased supply, commodity, and other costs, and an increased risk of cyberattacks. We can also be adversely affected by other global and regional factors that periodically occur, including: ?severe weather events and natural disasters, public health issues (including pandemics), and other catastrophic events; ?inefficient infrastructure and other disruptions, such as supply chain interruptions, materials shortages or delays, and large-scale outages or unreliable provision of services from utilities, transportation, data hosting, or telecommunications providers; ?formal or informal imposition of new or revised export, import, or doing-business regulations, including trade sanctions, tariffs, and changes in the ability to obtain export licenses, which could be changed without notice; ?government restrictions on, or nationalization of, our operations in any country, or restrictions on our ability to repatriate earnings from or distribute compensation or other funds in a particular country; ?adverse changes relating to government grants, tax credits, or other government incentives, including more favorable incentives provided to competitors; ?differing employment practices and labor issues, including restricted access to talent; ?ineffective legal protection of our IP rights in certain countries; ?local business and cultural factors that differ from our current standards and practices; ?continuing uncertainty regarding social, political, immigration, and tax and trade policies in the US and abroad; and ?fluctuations in the market values of our domestic and international investments, and in the capital and credit markets, which can be negatively affected by liquidity, credit deterioration or losses, interest rate changes, financial results, political risk, sovereign risk, or other factors.

Our operations and business, and those of our customers and suppliers, can be disrupted by: severe weather events and natural disasters; industrial accidents; public health issues and global pandemics such as COVID-19; cybersecurity incidents; interruptions of service from utilities, transportation restrictions or disruptions, telecommunications, or IT systems providers; manufacturing equipment failures; geopolitical conflict; terrorism; or other catastrophic events. For example, we have at times experienced disruptions in our manufacturing processes as a result of power outages, improperly functioning equipment, and disruptions in supply of raw materials or components, including cybersecurity incidents affecting our suppliers. Our headquarters and many of our operations and facilities are in locations that are prone to earthquakes and other natural disasters. Global climate change can result in certain natural disasters occurring more frequently or with greater intensity, such as drought, wildfires, storms, sea-level rise, and flooding, and could disrupt the availability of water necessary for the operation of our fabrication facilities, including our facilities located in water-sensitive regions such as Arizona and Israel. In addition, to the extent we are unable to successfully manage and conserve water resources, our reputation could be harmed. In recent years, the west coast of the US has experienced significant wildfires, including in Oregon, where we have major manufacturing facilities, and in California, where we are headquartered. The long-term effects of climate change on the global economy and the technology industry in particular are unclear but could be severe.

We are exposed to adverse as well as beneficial movements in currency exchange rates. Although most of our sales occur in US dollars, operating expenses and capital expenditures may be paid in local currencies. An increase in the value of the dollar can increase the real cost to our customers of our products in those markets outside the US where we sell in dollars, and a weakened dollar can increase the cost of expenses such as payroll, utilities, tax, and marketing expenses, as well as non-US dollar capital expenditures. We also conduct certain investing and financing activities in local currencies. Our hedging programs may not be effective to offset any, or more than a portion, of the adverse impact of currency exchange rate movements; therefore, changes in exchange rates can harm our results of operations and financial condition.