Intel Is Worst Performing Dow Stock This Year

Year to date, the worst performing stock in the Dow Jones Industrial Index is Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), down 8.16%. After the company reported first-quarter earnings last Tuesday shares actually traded higher because the company announced at the same time that it would layoff 12,000 employees worldwide (about 11% of its workforce).

Intel posted revenues of $13.8 billion in the first quarter, just $30 million short of estimates. Earnings per share totaled $0.54, about 11% better than estimates. But the company’s cash cow, the personal computer business, is dwindling.

Chip sales for PCs make up about 60% of Intel’s revenue stream. But PC sales in the quarter declined by nearly 10% to just under 65 million units, the first time since 2007 that shipment volume fell that low according to Gartner. PC sales in the U.S. fell 6.6% year over year in the first quarter to 13.1 million units, the lowest total in 3 years.

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Intel now says it is making headway in the cloud-computing sector:

The data center and Internet of Things (IoT) businesses are Intel’s primary growth engines, with memory and field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) accelerating these opportunities – fueling a virtuous cycle of growth for the company. These growth businesses delivered $2.2 billion in revenue growth last year, and made up 40 percent of revenue and the majority of operating profit, which largely offset the decline in the PC market segment.

For the second quarter Intel expects to report revenues at $13.5 billion, plus or minus $500 million, as well as restructuring charges of $1.2 billion. Consensus estimates that are call for $0.55 in EPS on $14.16 billion in revenue.

Intel stock closed at $31.64 on Friday, down about 1% for the day in a 52-week range of $24.87 to $35.59. The consensus price target on the stock is $35.53.