A company that spent years losing ground to every rival just put up the best nine-day stretch in its 55-year history.
Intel shares surged 56% over nine straight trading sessions, adding more than $100 billion in market value - the biggest run for any similar stretch since the company went public in 1971.
Two big moves kicked off the rally. On April 1, Intel announced it was buying back its fab in Ireland, signaling a bigger bet on manufacturing at a time when countries around the world are competing to secure domestic chip production.
The Ireland facility is one of Intel's most advanced plants, and bringing it back under full ownership gives the company more control over its production capacity.
Then on April 7, Intel joined Elon Musk's Terafab AI chip project alongside Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI - a deal aimed at building ultra-high-performance chips at massive scale for AI, robotics, and data centers. That is exactly the kind of contract Intel needs to prove its foundry business can compete with TSMC, the world's largest chip manufacturer.
The Terafab announcement was the bigger of the two catalysts because it validated Intel's manufacturing capabilities in the eyes of one of the most demanding customers in tech. If Musk trusts Intel to build chips for his AI ambitions, the thinking goes, other big companies might follow.
Intel has been trying to reinvent itself as a chip manufacturer for hire - what the industry calls a "foundry" - after years of falling behind TSMC in manufacturing technology. The company lost its lead in chip-making around 2018 and has spent billions trying to catch up, including opening new plants in Ohio and Arizona with help from the CHIPS Act.
Wells Fargo raised its price target, and several analysts upgraded the stock as the turnaround story shifted from speculation to something backed by real contracts. Intel hit a new 52-week high near $59 to $61 during the streak.
Short sellers got squeezed hard during the run. Intel had elevated short interest heading into April, with roughly 2.5% of its float sold short - below the sector average but still representing more than 115 million shares betting against the stock.
The rapid move higher forced bearish traders to cover their positions by buying shares - adding buying pressure on top of the positive news flow and amplifying the gains well beyond what the news alone would have driven.
Volume during the nine-day streak averaged more than triple Intel's normal daily trading, signaling that both institutional and retail investors were piling in as the momentum built.
A 56% move in nine days is not normal for a company Intel's size, which raises the question of whether this is a real turnaround or a short squeeze that got ahead of the news. If the Terafab deal brings real revenue and the Ireland fab ramps production, the rally has room to run.
If either stalls, the stock could give back gains just as fast. Intel reports Q1 earnings later this month, which will be the first real test of whether the financial numbers match the turnaround story.
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