Intel Stock Will Trade At This Price in 2028

The market is starting to re-rate Intel as an AI infrastructure franchise, but the second-order beneficiary set is broader than the stock itself. If 18A and advanced packaging actually convert into volume, the likely winners are not just INTC equity holders but ecosystem suppliers with clean exposure to tool install, EDA, and substrate scarcity; the constraint will shift from “can Intel build?” to “can the supply chain scale without margin leakage?” That creates an interesting asymmetry: Intel can rerate on narrative and mix before earnings fully normalize, while upstream vendors can monetize the capex wave with less balance-sheet risk.

The key risk is that investors are extrapolating early wins into a straight-line earnings recovery, but foundry turnarounds usually break on yield, utilization, or customer concentration. A pause in 14A is not just a project delay; it would signal that external demand is insufficient to justify the next capex leg, which would hit not only Intel’s multiple but also the AI-host CPU and packaging story embedded in adjacent winners. In that scenario, the stock’s recent momentum becomes a liability because the tape has already priced in operational inevitability over the next 6-12 months.

Consensus appears to be missing the timing mismatch between story and cash flow. The market is debating whether Intel can ever earn $200 by 2028, but the more tradable question is whether the next 2-3 quarters produce enough evidence to sustain multiple expansion without needing full EPS recovery. If that evidence fails to arrive, the forward P/E compresses fast because the equity is being valued on future operating leverage that remains optional, not yet confirmed. Conversely, if one additional external foundry logo lands, the stock could continue to squeeze higher on incremental conviction rather than fundamentals.