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Intel Shares Drop Nearly 3% to $87 Amid Dilution Worries Following Massive $20 Billion Equity Raise
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Shares of Intel Corp. fell nearly 3 percent on Monday, extending recent pressure on the stock as investors continued to weigh the impact of a large equity offering completed earlier this month and broader weakness across semiconductor names.
Intel stock traded at $87.14 in midday action, down $2.93 or 3.25 percent, according to market data from Aug. 24. The decline left the shares well below the $95 price set in the company’s recent common-stock sale and added to a multi-session slide that has erased a substantial portion of earlier gains this year.
The move comes roughly two weeks after Intel completed one of the largest follow-on equity offerings on record. The company initially sought to raise $15 billion and ultimately sold about $20 billion of shares at $95 each, with underwriters later exercising an option that brought the total closer to $23 billion. CEO Lip-Bu Tan described the raise in a statement as oversubscribed more than five times the initial goal, with strong participation from long-term institutional investors, sovereign funds and others.
“With this additional capital, Intel is now well positioned to meet the tremendous growth opportunity ahead of us in advanced node wafer manufacturing, advanced packaging and the massive CPU demand,” Tan said. He added that the company remains focused on execution and delivering returns to shareholders.
The offering was framed as funding for Intel’s capital-intensive turnaround, including expansion of its foundry operations and support for rising demand in artificial-intelligence computing. Intel raised its full-year capital expenditure outlook earlier this year and has emphasized the need for significant investment to advance its process technology roadmap, including the 18A node now in production and the planned 14A technology.
Despite the capital infusion, the stock has traded below the offer price in recent sessions. Market participants have pointed to dilution as a near-term concern. The addition of more than 200 million new shares increases the share count and is expected to reduce future earnings per share by several percentage points, according to analyst estimates. Some investors who participated in the offering are now holding shares at a paper loss relative to the $95 purchase price.
The selling pressure on Monday occurred against a backdrop of softer trading in technology and chip stocks more broadly. High-multiple growth names have faced headwinds from rising interest-rate expectations and selective rotation by investors. Intel’s shares have been particularly sensitive because of the combination of the recent capital raise and the company’s still-evolving foundry economics.
Intel reported second-quarter results in late July that showed marked improvement. Revenue reached $16.1 billion, up 25 percent from a year earlier — the strongest year-over-year growth in more than 15 years. Data Center and AI revenue rose 59 percent to about $6.3 billion, while the Foundry segment grew 31 percent to roughly $5.8 billion. Non-GAAP earnings per share came in at 42 cents.
“Our Q2 results represent our strongest revenue growth in more than fifteen years, enabled by greater speed, accountability, and customer focus,” Tan said in the earnings release. He also noted that “AI is driving unprecedented demand for compute, and as we continue to execute, Intel is well-positioned to capture sustainable growth across our CPU franchise, ASICs, advanced packaging and vast wafer foundry network.”
The company guided third-quarter revenue in a range of $15.8 billion to $16.8 billion. Management pointed to improving manufacturing yields, better cycle times and stronger customer engagement as evidence that operational changes implemented over the past year are beginning to take hold. The Foundry business continues to post operating losses, however, reflecting the heavy investment required to modernize factories and compete for external customers.
Intel has secured notable design wins and partnerships in recent quarters, including interest in its advanced packaging technologies and process nodes for AI-related silicon. Demand for server CPUs has strengthened as companies deploy agentic AI systems that rely more heavily on general-purpose processors for orchestration and inference workloads alongside specialized accelerators. Management has described supply as constrained in certain categories even as production capacity expands.
The stock’s longer-term trajectory remains tied to the success of the foundry strategy. Intel aims to become a leading contract manufacturer of advanced semiconductors while continuing to design and sell its own processors. Progress on 18A yields and a firmer commitment to high-volume production of the subsequent 14A process have been presented as key milestones. External foundry revenue remains a small fraction of the overall Foundry segment total, so scaling that business is viewed as critical to improving profitability.
Analyst views on the shares are mixed. Some firms have trimmed price targets following the equity raise while maintaining constructive longer-term ratings, citing the capital as necessary fuel for manufacturing investments. Others have adopted more cautious stances, focusing on dilution and the timeline required for foundry losses to narrow. Consensus forecasts still project growth, though estimates have been adjusted for the larger share count.
Monday’s decline fits a pattern of volatility that has characterized Intel shares throughout 2026. The stock reached highs above $140 earlier in the year before pulling back amid sector-wide concerns and company-specific developments. It remains substantially higher than levels seen in prior years when the turnaround was in earlier stages, yet the recent retreat has tested investor confidence in the pace of improvement.
Intel continues to emphasize operational discipline, customer focus and the competitive potential of its process technology. The company has highlighted progress in factory efficiency and the ability to meet rising internal and external demand. At the same time, the scale of capital required to rebuild manufacturing leadership remains large, and the market is closely monitoring both financial results and execution metrics for signs that the investments are translating into durable returns.
For the immediate term, attention is likely to remain on how the market digests the expanded share base, the trajectory of foundry losses, and the broader health of semiconductor demand. Intel’s next earnings report will provide an update on third-quarter performance and any further adjustments to spending or customer commitments. Until then, the shares appear sensitive to shifts in risk appetite across the technology sector and to any new developments related to the company’s financing and manufacturing plans.
The combination of a major capital raise, solid recent revenue growth and ongoing questions about the timeline for foundry profitability has left Intel stock in a period of digestion. Whether the additional resources accelerate the turnaround enough to support higher valuations will depend on consistent execution in the quarters ahead.
David Ellison — the founder of a film production company and son of billionaire Larry Ellison — has been at the helm of Paramount Skydance for just over a year. He’s been fighting to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery for nearly as long.
The latest roadblock in his path, a group of state attorneys general seeking to stop the deal, may be his toughest yet. The antitrust hurdle and related delay have left the CEO hunting for avenues to get the deal done.
The delay in closing Paramount’s acquisition of WBD could add hefty costs on top of the $110 billion proposed price tag at a time when media companies across the landscape are under intense pressure.
Yet, with a trial in the antitrust case set for March, Ellison has never felt more confident that the deal not only makes sense, but will get completed, according to a person familiar with his thinking, who asked to remain unnamed to speak candidly.
“The company believes strongly in this,” Paramount’s lead trial attorney Jeffrey Kessler said on CNBC in July, adding the company was prepared to bring the matter to the Supreme Court if necessary.
Still, Ellison appears to be making little ground with California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who is leading the states’ charge in court. Both sides have said they are eager to make amends outside of the courtroom.
“I think the whole issue there is, will the state AGs be interested in settling, and I’m not quite sure there’s any real incentive for them to settle given the fact the California home constituency here is overwhelmingly against the transaction,” said Tom Rogers, a media veteran who’s currently senior advisor to Versant Media Group and executive chairman of AI film and TV production company Fountain 0.
A Paramount spokesperson declined to comment for this article.
The final threat
Ellison’s pursuit of WBD began last September with three unsolicited bids to take over the storied entertainment company, which includes the legendary film studio, a portfolio of pay TV networks and the HBO Max streaming business.
Ellison’s interest ultimately spurred a formal sale process that superseded a plan by WBD to split in two. When Warner Bros. Discovery crowned Netflix the bidding war winner, Ellison went hostile and promised WBD shareholders a premium.
In February, Netflix abandoned its pending transaction and Paramount entered into an agreement to buy the entirety of WBD. The deal has won approval from all global regulators, including the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
That leaves Bonta and the other 11 suing states as the final threat to Ellison’s long-sought-after acquisition.
Bonta has said his aim is in part to take up the baton where he feels President Donald Trump’s administration has fallen short on regulation. He has said Trump has gotten “involved improperly” in other merger situations.
Meanwhile, the Ellison family’s ties to Trump have drawn criticism. Larry Ellison is a longtime supporter of Trump, and the president has said publicly he’d like to see Warner Bros. Discovery’s CNN land in Paramount’s hands.
When speculation began in the spring that a group of states would seek to challenge the merger — putting particular focus on two segments of the combination: their extensive portfolios of pay TV networks and powerhouse film studios — Ellison’s Paramount immediately began its outreach to Bonta’s office, according to the person familiar with the matter. By mid-May the company had sent a list of potential concessions to Bonta, added the person.
Following a preliminary injunction granted by the California district court, which paused any movement on the deal for 14 days, Paramount said it was willing to officially delay the deal and move to a trial to fight its case for the merger.
However, the March trial date was later than company executives had hoped for, according to two people familiar with the matter.
In the ensuing weeks, Paramount went on the offensive.
Paramount’s playbook
Shortly after the lawsuit hit in mid-July, Ellison took his argument for the deal public, writing a New York Times op-ed. That piece followed others from industry leaders arguing both for and against the merger, expanding the debate beyond legal filings.
Ellison has also sought to win over Hollywood exhibitors with contracts guaranteeing that a combined Paramount-WBD would release a a minimum 30 films a year with 45-day theatrical windows for a period of at least three years, according to a person familiar with the contracts, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
And, reports surfaced that Paramount was considering relocating its studio and headquarters outside of California in response to Bonta’s challenge. One of the people familiar with the matter told CNBC a move to Tennessee was on the table.
That suggestion largely backfired, with Bonta calling the threat to relocate “blackmail.”
Last Thursday, the California AG said in a CNBC interview that he would be willing to hold talks outside of the courtroom, but that a settlement would require “robust structural remedies.”
The following day a meeting was held at Bonta’s office, according to a statement from the government official’s spokesperson. While another meeting was slated for Monday, media reports of the meeting and what an eventual settlement could entrail — such as divesting some pay TV networks — led Bonta to call off the discussions, his office said.
On Monday, a Bonta spokesperson alleged that Paramount was behind the “leak” of the parties’ discussions, which it further said were misrepresented, and said it demonstrated a “lack of good faith.”
“As soon as Paramount stops playing games and engages sincerely, my office is happy to meet again,” Bonta said.
Paramount responded later Monday denying it was the source of the leak.
“We remain hopeful and stand ready to continue good faith discussions to resolve the Attorneys General suit and move forward with our plans for increased competition and increased output to the benefit of the talent and entertainment workers,” the company said in a statement.
Coming to the negotiating table
While the contents of Paramount’s list of concessions — as sent to Bonta’s office back in May — remain unclear, they appear to be in contrast to what Bonta and his peers have raised red flags about.
″[Paramount] wanted to talk about everything except for what this case is about. They want to talk about the streaming market, which we don’t allege in our complaint. They want to talk about CNN, which is not a focus of our complaint. They want to talk about the foreign regulators. We want to talk about the three markets that we set forth in our complaint, where we think there’s antitrust violation,” Bonta said in an interview with David Faber on CNBC last week.
Paramount has declined to discuss what possible remedies it set forth, with the exception of the commitments it’s made to the film industry.
In a July interview on CNBC, Paramount attorney Kessler said the company had been willing to put in writing that it would commit to 30 films per year, legitimatizing an earlier promise made by Ellison that struck some as unrealistic given Hollywood track records.
If Paramount were to fall short of that promise, it’d be opening itself up to litigation, Kessler said. That commitment became the underpinning for Paramount’s offer to sign contracts with Hollywood exhibitors, at least one of which took the offer, according to the person familiar.
In recent days, the Wall Street Journal reported the state AGs were seeking a divestiture of some of the pay TV networks included in the merger. The combination of Paramount and WBD would create the biggest portfolio of networks in the industry, and the states have argued that no matter the state of the business, that scale creates outsized power.
“Whether the market is shrinking or growing is really irrelevant,” Bonta said on CNBC last week, adding a combined Paramount-WBD would create a “presumptively illegal market concentration” in film and TV.
But the ongoing industry challenges — particularly for these two companies — has been the basis for Ellison’s push to merge. And it may be a better argument than Bonta would admit.
Better together
Industry analysts, experts and insiders have consistently poked holes in the states’ argument that the combination of TV networks would create antitrust issues.
“The merger does create a larger competitor, but size alone is not evidence of market position. Neither company has possessed the scale necessary to compete effectively against much larger global streaming platforms and well-funded technology companies,” Bernstein analysts said in a recent note.
Media companies’ most recent earnings reports — including those from WBD and Paramount — once again put on display the ongoing losses for pay TV advertising and distribution revenue streams.
Paramount’s chosen remedy is scale.
Both companies’ portfolios are made up of dozens of TV networks, with Paramount’s offering including channels like Nickelodeon, MTV and BET, and WBD owning channels like TNT, CNN, TBS and the Discovery Channel. Paramount also owns the broadcast network CBS.
“The economics of Pay-TV are being dictated by consumer behavior rather than consolidation. The merger may change the scale of a participant, but it does not change the direction of the industry’s secular trajectory,” the Bernstein analysts said.
It’s a similar story in streaming and films, where Paramount would similarly combined the two companies portfolios.
Ellison has said upon completion of the merger, Paramount+ and HBO Max would become one service. And the combined entity would encompass two major film studios. And yet neither company is dominating in either category.
“The states also argue that the combined company would control approximately 27% of US theatrical releases and roughly 30% of blockbuster film distribution. Those figures are certainly meaningful, but they fall well short of establishing a dominant market position. More importantly, theatrical market share is dependent on annual content slates,” the Bernstein analysts wrote.
Pay TV profits
Executives at the company believe the rate of pay TV decline is beginning to stabilize.
“The rate of decline of subscribers is starting to ebb, meaning we’re not quite there yet, but an ascent to where we’re going to steadily see a base of subscribers, I would say, probably in the mid-30 million range in the country,” said Andy Gordon, chief strategy officer and chief operating officer at Paramount, in a recent interview.
Still, a recent report from S&P Global Ratings notes that while the rate of cord cutting has improved in the U.S., it doesn’t see much improvement to leverage for these companies over the next couple of years, meaning media companies won’t have as much power in distribution discussions with pay TV operators.
And in general, despite subscriber losses, these channels are still profitable and often used to fund other parts of media businesses, such as building out streaming services or paying down heavy debt loads.
Since Warner Bros. and Discovery combined in 2022, the company has been aggressively repaying the debt that largely stemmed from that merger.
If Paramount’s acquisition of WBD were to close, the combined company would have nearly $80 billion in debt.
Delays past Sept. 30 would only increase the amount of expenses on Paramount’s plate as the company becomes responsible for a “ticking fee” due to WBD shareholders. Paramount has requested that the court force the suing states to post a bond of $1.88 billion to cover the fees and costs associated with the delay.
— CNBC’s Sarah Whitten contributed to this report.
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On the other side of the US, Rachel Miller, chef and owner of Nightshade Noodle Bar in the town Lynn, Massachusetts, moved to a tip-free model five years ago when they reopened after the Covid-19 pandemic.
Her motivation was to make it fairer for the kitchen staff.
“The people breaking their backs and minds in the kitchen – often the least visible and the least celebrated – were taking home a fraction of what the front staff made on tips for the same hours,” she says.
Miller says she found it “deeply unsettling” to see higher tips going to white male staff and lower tips to everyone else.
“Tipping lets guests, consciously or not, pay people differently based on gender, race, or sexuality and I was not willing to let that decide my team’s income.”
To pay the staff higher wages, Miller also increased prices at the French-Vietnamese restaurant. Its tasting menus now start from £102 for seven courses before 6pm, and $126 for nine courses.
“Our prices are higher than a comparable restaurant’s because they carry the full cost of paying people properly,” says Miller. “That is the trade, and I stand behind it.”
The Lonski Group president and founder John Lonski analyzes rising bond yields, crude oil spikes and inflation concerns on ‘Maria Bartiromo’s Wall Street.’
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Monday that the regularly scheduled Treasury auctions of U.S. debt are expected to continue per usual after his agency announced an increase in the size of buybacks of longer-dated securities.
Bessent spoke Monday at a press conference to discuss a new plan for the “economic asphyxiation” of the Iranian regime through the implementation of secondary sanctions on Iran’s trading partners.
During the press conference, the Treasury secretary was asked about whether the agency may reduce the size of auctions for longer-term debt going forward or if there are other actions from the department’s toolkit that may be used to help lower yields.
“We are going to continue with our regular program of auctions. So you will be hearing from us again at the beginning of next quarter,” Bessent said. He added in response to a follow-up question that, “We haven’t bought a single bond yet.”
TREASURY YIELDS HIT MULTI-DECADE HIGHS AMID SURGING NATIONAL DEBT
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said auctions of Treasurys will continue as scheduled despite the larger buybacks on longer-dated securities. (Krisanne Johnson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Bessent noted that the next auctions of longer-dated Treasurys, such as the 10-year note and the 20- and 30-year bonds, aren’t scheduled until mid-September which is the earliest the new buyback structure could come into play after the change takes effect on Sept. 9.
Under the change, which was announced on Aug. 19, the Treasury’s maximum buyback authority rises from $2 billion per operation to at least $4 billion per operation, which will serve as a floor rather than a cap to allow the size of buybacks to respond to market conditions.
The change is expected to remain in effect through the rest of the quarter, or through Nov. 4, after which the Treasury will provide more information about future buyback sizes.
Treasury said in its announcement that the “increase in buyback operations reflects Treasury’s desire to provide greater liquidity support in longer-dated nominal sectors where there is consistent strong sponsorship from market participants, as evidenced by the significant volume of high-quality offers Treasury routinely receives in longer-dated buyback operations.”
US NATIONAL DEBT HITS $40 TRILLION MILESTONE FOR FIRST TIME EVER
Yields on Treasurys are near multi-year highs amid the rise in the U.S. national debt and geopolitical uncertainty. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)
Last week’s announcement lowered yields on the 10-year Treasury note and on 20- and 30-year bonds for a short period of time, though they largely retraced those declines by the end of the week. Yields were down modestly on Monday.
Bessent said last week that the higher buybacks aim to support liquidity in a more thinly traded portion of the market, particularly in the 30-year sector, while the longer-dated Treasurys are also competing with heavy issuance of corporate bonds at higher yields amid the artificial intelligence (AI) buildout.
Higher yields on Treasurys can cause fiscal pressure for the federal government, which is forced to pay more interest to service the national debt. The move comes as the U.S. gross national debt topped $40 trillion for the first time ever last week.
BESSENT LAYS OUT 5 PRINCIPLES GUIDING TRUMP ADMIN’S APPROACH TO ECONOMIC STATECRAFT
The Treasury Department’s announcement didn’t indicate the funding source for the Treasury buybacks. A Reuters report noted that the Treasury General Account (TGA) at the Federal Reserve could serve as a source because it would negate the need to issue new, shorter-dated Treasurys – though it would eat into the nation’s cash reserves.
The TGA effectively functions as the federal government’s checking account, as it’s used to pay for daily government operations ranging from federal worker salaries, contracts and Treasury’s interest and principal obligations.
As of last Wednesday, the TGA stood at about $940 billion in funding. Treasury has beefed up the TGA this year in part to help pay for some of the $166 billion in tariff refunds owed to importers in the wake of a Supreme Court ruling that struck down a key portion of President Donald Trump’s tariff regime.
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In the past year, the TGA has had an average balance of around $840 billion, which was the highest ever outside its rapid run-up during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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Buc-ee’s CEO suggested recently that the Texas-based travel center chain may be done looking into blue districts, saying some communities do not appreciate what the company brings while conservative states offer business-friendly and family-oriented values.
Arch “Beaver” Aplin III, the company’s president and co-founder, made the comments during the grand opening of Buc-ee’s newest location in Benton, Arkansas on August 17. The chain is known for its expansive gas stations, famously clean restrooms and in-house food offerings.
“We have a lot of opportunities. We’re growing. We’re building in a lot of places. But when you find a conservative business-friendly state with a phenomenal workforce, it makes a difference,” Aplin said.
Aplin criticized states that he said do not appreciate what Buc-ee’s brings to their communities, suggesting the company would rather focus its expansion efforts elsewhere.
BUC-EE’S OPENS FIRST ARKANSAS LOCATION AS CHAIN EXPANDS ACROSS US
Buc-ee’s co-founder and CEO Arch “Beaver” Aplin III waves during the grand opening ceremony of the first Buc-ee’s location on the East Coast on June 30, 2025, in Mount Crawford, Virginia. Aplin said expansion will focus more on conservative states. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“I’m starting to realize life’s too short to try to build in places that people don’t appreciate what you’re bringing, versus a place like this where people do appreciate what you are building,” he said.
Conservative states typically promote business-friendly and family-oriented policies that align with Buc-ee’s values, Aplin said.
“That leadership, that concept, that idea of conservative, business-friendly, family-oriented concept works so much better if it trickles down from the very leadership from the top at the governor’s office, at the congressman, at senator, at the mayor, the representatives,” he said.
Aplin pointed to Benton as an example of the approach, saying the city’s business-friendly environment helped pave the way for Buc-ee’s newest location.
“What we found when we got here into Benton was a business-friendly town,” he said.
CALIFORNIA PIZZA KITCHEN CO-FOUNDER OPENS UP ABOUT FAMOUS CHAIN’S WILD RISE, BANKRUPTCY AND COMEBACK
Buc-ee’s travel centers typically feature 120 fuel pumps across 74,000 square feet. (Getty Images / Getty Images)
Founded in 1982, Buc-ee’s operates sprawling travel centers that typically feature 74,000 square feet of space and 120 fueling positions. The locations often create more than 200 jobs, according to the company.
Buc-ee’s currently has 58 locations, including 37 in Texas, according to the company’s website.
The chain has expanded to 13 other states, including Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, South Carolina and Virginia.
Nearly all the cities where Buc-ee’s operates are located in areas that generally lean conservative, with a few exceptions where local political dynamics are more mixed.
Auburn, Alabama, for example, is a college town located in a predominantly Republican county, giving it a more politically mixed environment than some surrounding communities.
Brunswick, Georgia, has a Democratic-leaning municipal base despite being located in Glynn County, which has generally leaned Republican.
Goodyear, Arizona, has become a competitive suburban area in recent election cycles and is located in the West Valley of Maricopa County, a region that has historically leaned Republican but has become increasingly politically competitive.
Visitors shop for brisket sandwiches at a Buc-ee’s location in Rockingham County, Virginia, on July 2, 2025. (Valerie Plesch/For The Washington Post / Getty Images)
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More Buc-ee’s locations are slated to open in the coming years, including a travel center in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, on Nov. 16.
Six locations are also expected to open in 2027, including sites in Ruston, Louisiana; Kansas City, Kansas; Gallaway, Tennessee; St. Lucie, Florida; Boerne, Texas; and Monroe County, Georgia.
Two additional locations are planned for 2028 in Mebane, North Carolina, and Lafayette, Louisiana.
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Bangkok Dusit Medical Services Public Company Limited 2026 Q2 – Results – Earnings Call Presentation (OTCMKTS:BDULF) 2026-08-24
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NVIDIA Stock Drops Nearly 2 Percent to $210 on Seventh Losing Day Ahead of Critical AI Earnings
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Shares of NVIDIA Corp. fell nearly 2 percent on Monday, extending a multi-day slide that has become the chipmaker’s longest losing streak in nearly four years, as investors grew cautious ahead of the company’s closely watched quarterly earnings report.
NVIDIA stock traded around $210.07 in midday action, down about $4.65 or 2.17 percent, according to market data. The decline put the shares on track for a seventh consecutive session of losses and marked one of the steeper single-day drops in recent weeks. The stock has fallen roughly 6.7 percent over the current streak and remains more than 10 percent below its all-time closing high of $235.74 set in mid-May.
The pullback comes just days before NVIDIA is scheduled to report fiscal second-quarter results on Wednesday after the market close. Wall Street analysts on average expect revenue of approximately $92 billion, representing growth of about 96 percent from the year-earlier period, with adjusted earnings per share near $2.09. Data-center revenue, the primary driver of the company’s results, is projected near $85 billion, more than double the year-ago figure, according to consensus estimates.
Investors have grown increasingly selective about high-valuation technology stocks in recent sessions. Broader semiconductor shares also declined Monday, with the iShares Semiconductor ETF falling nearly 3 percent. Micron Technology dropped more than 6 percent, while Advanced Micro Devices and Broadcom also posted losses. The Nasdaq Composite was lower while the Dow Jones Industrial Average showed relative resilience.
Several factors contributed to the pressure on NVIDIA shares. Reports indicated the company has signaled to some large customers that prices for AI servers could rise by more than 15 percent, prompting questions about whether higher infrastructure costs might moderate demand from hyperscale cloud providers. Separately, investor attention has focused on NVIDIA’s expanding role in helping arrange external financing for data-center buildouts through partnerships with major financial firms. Some market participants have described elements of these arrangements as circular financing, in which the supplier helps facilitate purchases of its own products.
Geopolitical developments added to the cautious tone. Risk sentiment weakened after comments from U.S. officials regarding sanctions and economic measures targeting Iran, contributing to a broader rotation away from growth-oriented technology names. Rising Treasury yields have also weighed on high-multiple stocks throughout the recent period.
Despite the near-term stock weakness, NVIDIA continues to dominate the market for advanced artificial-intelligence accelerators. The company’s Blackwell architecture has driven rapid growth in data-center revenue, and management has pointed to strong customer adoption of both Blackwell and the forthcoming Vera Rubin platform. In prior comments, founder and Chief Executive Jensen Huang has described the buildout of AI infrastructure as accelerating and has expressed confidence in substantial multi-year revenue from the Blackwell and Rubin generations.
NVIDIA remains supply-constrained even as it works to expand production capacity. The company has secured commitments intended to support robust growth while acknowledging that demand continues to outpace available supply for its highest-performance systems. Hyperscalers, enterprises and sovereign entities remain key buyers of the GPUs used to train and run large language models and agentic AI applications.
The stock’s recent valuation has compressed relative to earlier peaks. After reaching elevated multiples during the initial AI investment surge, NVIDIA now trades at levels closer to those seen before the most intense phase of the boom, according to market data. Some analysts have noted that the shares appear more reasonably priced on a forward-earnings basis than at previous highs, though expectations for continued outsized growth remain elevated.
Monday’s trading volume was among the highest in the S&P 500, reflecting active positioning ahead of the earnings release. History shows that NVIDIA shares have often experienced short-term volatility in the sessions immediately following results, even when the underlying numbers have exceeded expectations. The company has a track record of beating both its own guidance and consensus estimates, though the margin of those beats has drawn closer scrutiny as the absolute figures have grown larger.
NVIDIA’s market capitalization still ranks among the largest of any publicly traded company, reflecting its central position in the AI supply chain. The firm’s gross margins have remained high, supported by the specialized nature of its products and software ecosystem. Free cash flow generation has enabled substantial capital returns to shareholders, including expanded share-repurchase authorizations and a higher quarterly dividend announced earlier in the year.
Looking ahead, investors will focus on several metrics in Wednesday’s report: sequential growth in data-center revenue, commentary on the ramp of next-generation platforms, any updates on supply-chain constraints, and forward guidance for the current quarter. Management’s outlook on customer capital spending, pricing trends and the durability of AI infrastructure demand is expected to shape the near-term stock reaction.
The semiconductor sector more broadly has seen mixed performance this year as investors rotate among memory, foundry and accelerator names. While NVIDIA has underperformed some peers on a year-to-date basis relative to its earlier gains, its absolute revenue and profit growth continue to stand out within the industry.
For now, the combination of pre-earnings caution, higher component and infrastructure costs, and a less risk-tolerant market environment has kept pressure on the shares. Whether the upcoming results and guidance can reverse the recent losing streak will depend on how far the reported figures and management commentary exceed the already elevated bar set by analysts and investors.
NVIDIA’s trajectory remains closely tied to the pace of global AI investment. As cloud providers, enterprises and governments continue to expand computing capacity, demand for the company’s products is expected to remain a central factor in technology sector performance through the remainder of the year and beyond.
The drop on Iran’s informal currency markets came as Washington prepared to announce even more extensive sanctions that it said would be an “economic D-Day” and would add further pressure.
The currency had already been under pressure before the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, amid double-digit inflation and negative growth but has been hitting new record lows as nearly six months of war have taken an even greater toll.
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