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AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) and Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) sent semiconductor stocks lower on Wednesday as the sector sold off amid comments Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell that more interest rate hikes may be needed to combat persistently high inflation.
AMD (AMD) shares sank almost 6%falling to their worst levels in more than a week, even as the company said it would invest up to $135 million over four years to expand its presence in Ireland.
The funds will be used to develop research, development and engineering operations in adaptive computing, as well as strategic R&D projects.
Intel (INTC), which competes with AMD, fell more than 5% after business said it had sold a minority stake in its IMS Nanofabrication unit to Bain Capital, valuing the unit at $4.3 billion.
Intel (INTC) Also gave an update on its transition to becoming a foundry for other chipmakers, saying it foresees a “wide class” of increased efficiency.
The chip giant’s executives said transitioning to the in-house foundry model would deliver cost savings of more than $8 billion to $10 billion by 2025 and have adjusted gross margins of 60%.
Separately on Wednesday, the Intel group led by Pat Gelsinger (INTC) also announced the first generative AI model used for 3D mapping.
NVIDIA (NVDA), which competes with both Intel and AMD, fell 2.2% as the company continued to maintain its $1,000,000 valuation.
A number of other chip stocks also lost ground on Wednesday, including Qualcomm (COMQ), Texas Instruments (TXN) and Broadcom (AVGO), all fell 1.5% or more.
Analog Devices (ADI), NXP Semiconductors (NXPI) and ON Semiconductors (ON) came out a little better, because the trio down just under 1% shortly before 1:30 p.m. EST.
Smartphone-related semiconductor stocks also lost ground on Wednesday, including Skyworks Solutions (SWKS), Qorvo (QRVO) and Micron technology (IN).
