Intel Stock Set to Rocket Higher as Blockbuster Deals Fuel Market Confidence

Intel's momentum isn't slowing down—strategic partnerships ignite bullish sentiment across trading floors.

Deals Drive Dominance

Fresh collaborations position Intel at the forefront of tech innovation, pulling institutional investors off the sidelines. Market analysts track increased volume and upgraded price targets as confidence builds.

Wall Street's latest darling? Maybe—but remember, traditional finance always chases yesterday's winners while missing the next revolution entirely.

Image source: Getty Images.

How Softbank could help

Softbank owns a majority stake in. Arm-based chips dominate the smartphone market, and they're starting to compete with Intel in PCs and servers as well. Arm doesn't sell chips directly, instead licensing its designs and intellectual property to companies including,,, and many others.

Intel has been collaborating with Arm since 2023 to ensure the Intel 18A process is optimized for Arm-based chips. Earlier this month, Intel temporarily posted a video showcasing a reference SoC called "Deer Creek Falls," which is built on Arm technology and uses the Intel 18A manufacturing process. This is likely an effort to showcase that Intel 18A is capable of supporting advanced Arm-based chips.

For Arm-based chip designers, having a viable alternative tofor manufacturing WOULD be valuable, potentially lowering costs. And with the threat of massive U.S. semiconductor tariffs looming, using Intel for manufacturing could be a path to avoiding any tariffs.

How the U.S. government could help

While a deal between Intel and the U.S. government for a stake in the company is still up in the air, if the government does take a stake in Intel, it could create an incentive for chip designers to seriously consider Intel for manufacturing. Big tech companies have been making big promises about U.S. investments to curry favor with the Trump administration, including a $600 billion commitment from Apple. Apple has also committed to buying U.S.-sourced rare earth magnets.

It's unclear how involved the Trump administration would be in the event it does take a stake in Intel, but even if it remains a passive investor, chip designers may see choosing Intel for manufacturing as a way to pump up their made-in-America credentials. Intel 18A may not be an option for the largest chip designers like Apple or Nvidia, but both are reportedly considering Intel 14A for trial production.

Things are starting to look up for Intel

Intel still needs to regain lost market share in its PC and server CPU businesses, and it absolutely needs the Intel 18A process to deliver solid performance and efficiency gains, since the company has multiple products set to use the technology. Panther Lake for laptops is scheduled for launch later this year, and its Clearwater Forest server CPU will use Intel 18A when it launches in 2026.

There's a lot of work to be done, but capital infusions from Softbank and potentially the U.S. government will take some financial pressure off of the struggling company. On top of the new sources of cash, Intel may have better luck scoring external foundry customers with powerful backers having every incentive to see Intel's foundry efforts succeed.

For Intel stock to really soar, all it will take is a single large external foundry customer committing to the company. That looks more likely to happen now than it did even a few weeks ago, as Softbank and potentially the U.S. government get involved.