Intel Just Got a Wall Street Call for $200 a Share — Here's Why

Intel shares jumped 4.7% Tuesday after two separate Wall Street analysts raised their price targets on the same day — a rare coincidence that turned heads. Tigress Financial's Ivan Feinseth bumped his target to $145 from $118 while keeping a Buy rating. Melius Research's Ben Reitzes went further, reiterating a Buy and a $165 target, but the headline number came buried deeper in his note.

Reitzes thinks Intel's foundry business alone could eventually be worth more than $80 a share — and so could the traditional CPU and product business. Add those two together and you get his real long-term number: $200.

Context matters here. Intel stock has already ripped 163% higher this year to around $97, blowing past AMD's roughly 130% gain and crushing the VanEck Semiconductor ETF's 50% return, according to figures cited in Reitzes's note this week. This isn't a call on a stock that's been sitting flat — it's a call that the run still has room left in it.

The dilution story is worth watching too. Intel recently raised nearly $20 billion by selling shares at $95, which diluted existing shareholders by about 3.5%. Normally that's a red flag on its own. Reitzes reads it as the cost of funding the foundry buildout — capital going toward capacity Intel needs to compete for outside manufacturing customers.

Intel shares have gained about 163% this year, outperforming AMD's roughly 130% gain and the VanEck Semiconductor ETF's approximately 50% return.

The foundry thesis is the whole ballgame for the bull case right now. Reitzes believes Intel's manufacturing assets — fabs, engineers, IP, packaging tech — become more valuable every quarter as the U.S. pushes to bring chip production home. He floated a possible spin-out of the foundry unit around 2030, which would let the market value it as a standalone U.S. semiconductor manufacturer rather than a drag on Intel's product business.

He also flagged something concrete for 2027: Intel plans to significantly increase capital spending above 2026 levels, largely tied to its next-generation 14A manufacturing process. Reitzes takes that as a signal of confidence from CEO Lip-Bu Tan's team, not just spending for spending's sake.

There's outside validation too. Strategic investments from the U.S. government, Nvidia, and SoftBank have all landed on Intel's cap table this year — a signal that deep-pocketed, sophisticated players are betting on the turnaround alongside retail money.

Here's the catch for anyone chasing this: not every analyst agrees. TipRanks shows a consensus Hold rating on Intel, based on seven Buys, 23 Holds, and two Sells, with an average price target of just $117.56 — well below both Feinseth's and Reitzes's numbers. Most of the Street is still cautious even as a couple of high-profile names get bullish.

That split matters for how you size a position. If you're buying INTC here, you're betting the foundry bet pays off over years, not quarters — and that Lip-Bu Tan's operational turnaround shows up in margins before dilution and capex spending erode the story in the meantime.

Reitzes himself carries real weight on this call: he's a five-star analyst on TipRanks, ranked in the top 6% of the more than 12,000 analysts tracked, with a 63% success rate and a 24% average return per rating historically.

What to watch next: any concrete update on foundry customer wins — external chip orders, not just Intel's own products — and progress on the 14A process node. Those are the checkpoints that would move this story from thesis to proof for skeptical investors.

Bottom line: Intel's had a monster year, and two respected analysts just said it's not done yet — but the Street's much lower average target says plenty of room for skepticism still remains too.