Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) Shares Gap Down Following Analyst Downgrade

Shares of Intel Co. (NASDAQ:INTC - Get Free Report) gapped down prior to trading on Friday after Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price target on the stock from $43.00 to $38.00. The stock had previously closed at $35.11, but opened at $31.78. Wells Fargo & Company currently has an equal weight rating on the stock. Intel shares last traded at $31.42, with a volume of 35,288,315 shares trading hands.

Several other analysts also recently weighed in on INTC. Rosenblatt Securities reiterated a "sell" rating and issued a $17.00 price objective on shares of Intel in a research report on Friday. Wedbush lowered their price objective on Intel from $40.00 to $32.50 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Roth Mkm lowered their price objective on Intel from $45.00 to $35.00 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Sanford C. Bernstein lowered their price objective on Intel from $42.00 to $35.00 and set a "market perform" rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Finally, HSBC reduced their target price on Intel from $44.00 to $37.00 and set a "hold" rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twenty-one have assigned a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $39.75.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Intel news, CEO Patrick P. Gelsinger purchased 2,800 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 1st. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $42.74 per share, with a total value of $119,672.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the chief executive officer now directly owns 31,275 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,336,693.50. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In other Intel news, CEO Patrick P. Gelsinger purchased 2,800 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 1st. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $42.74 per share, with a total value of $119,672.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the chief executive officer now directly owns 31,275 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,336,693.50. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Patrick P. Gelsinger purchased 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 29th. The shares were acquired at an average cost of $43.36 per share, for a total transaction of $130,080.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the chief executive officer now owns 28,475 shares of the company's stock, valued at $1,234,676. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.04% of the company's stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in Intel by 1.2% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 385,787,907 shares of the chip maker's stock valued at $19,385,842,000 after acquiring an additional 4,678,169 shares during the period. Capital International Investors lifted its holdings in Intel by 0.3% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 96,617,951 shares of the chip maker's stock valued at $4,855,099,000 after acquiring an additional 318,495 shares during the period. Primecap Management Co. CA increased its position in Intel by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. Primecap Management Co. CA now owns 75,237,927 shares of the chip maker's stock worth $3,780,706,000 after buying an additional 475,636 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Intel in the fourth quarter worth about $2,424,202,000. Finally, Northern Trust Corp increased its position in Intel by 3.7% in the third quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 46,003,776 shares of the chip maker's stock worth $1,635,434,000 after buying an additional 1,626,127 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 64.53% of the company's stock.

Intel Stock Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 1.54 and a quick ratio of 1.15. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $40.88 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.23. The firm has a market cap of $134.79 billion, a PE ratio of 81.75, a PEG ratio of 3.13 and a beta of 1.00.

Intel (NASDAQ:INTC - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 25th. The chip maker reported $0.54 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.27 by $0.27. The business had revenue of $15.40 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $15.16 billion. Intel had a return on equity of 1.64% and a net margin of 3.11%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 9.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.10 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that Intel Co. will post 0.6 EPS for the current year.

Intel Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Saturday, June 1st. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, May 7th will be given a $0.125 dividend. This represents a $0.50 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.57%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, May 6th. Intel's payout ratio is 128.21%.

Intel Company Profile

Intel Corporation designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and sells computing and related products and services worldwide. It operates through Client Computing Group, Data Center and AI, Network and Edge, Mobileye, and Intel Foundry Services segments. The company's products portfolio comprises central processing units and chipsets, system-on-chips (SoCs), and multichip packages; mobile and desktop processors; hardware products comprising graphics processing units (GPUs), domain-specific accelerators, and field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs); and memory and storage, connectivity and networking, and other semiconductor products.