Stock Traders Purchase Large Volume of Intel Call Options (NASDAQ:INTC)

Key Points

• Intel experienced a significant surge in options trading with 889,526 call options purchased, marking a 105% increase over the average daily volume.
• The stock has been boosted by various analysts, with updates on target prices reflecting a mixture of "hold" and "neutral" ratings; the current consensus rating is "Reduce" with an average target of $22.20.
• In trading on Thursday, Intel's stock rose 24% to $30.89, with trading volume significantly surpassing its average, driven by recent positive earnings trends despite a quarterly loss.

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC - Get Free Report) saw unusually large options trading activity on Thursday. Investors bought 889,526 call options on the company. This represents an increase of approximately 105% compared to the average daily volume of 433,393 call options.

Institutional Trading of Intel

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Westbourne Investments Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Intel by 319.4% during the first quarter. Westbourne Investments Inc. now owns 71,425 shares of the chip maker's stock valued at $1,622,000 after acquiring an additional 54,395 shares during the period. Swedbank AB boosted its holdings in shares of Intel by 5.0% during the second quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 9,467,128 shares of the chip maker's stock valued at $212,064,000 after acquiring an additional 454,234 shares during the period. Czech National Bank lifted its holdings in Intel by 7.2% in the second quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 1,066,599 shares of the chip maker's stock worth $23,892,000 after purchasing an additional 72,065 shares during the period. 180 Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in Intel by 124.9% in the first quarter. 180 Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 127,916 shares of the chip maker's stock worth $2,905,000 after purchasing an additional 71,049 shares during the period. Finally, Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC acquired a new stake in Intel in the second quarter worth about $345,245,000. Institutional investors own 64.53% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have weighed in on INTC. Sanford C. Bernstein restated a "market perform" rating on shares of Intel in a report on Tuesday, August 19th. DZ Bank restated a "sell" rating on shares of Intel in a report on Friday. New Street Research raised their target price on shares of Intel from $21.00 to $23.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a report on Wednesday, September 10th. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of Intel from $19.00 to $25.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a report on Friday. Finally, Roth Capital reiterated a "neutral" rating and set a $30.00 price target on shares of Intel in a report on Thursday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, twenty-two have issued a Hold rating and six have issued a Sell rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of "Reduce" and a consensus price target of $24.27.

Intel Stock Down 3.2%

Shares of NASDAQ:INTC traded down $0.99 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $29.58. The company had a trading volume of 224,890,676 shares, compared to its average volume of 93,261,976. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.42, a current ratio of 1.24 and a quick ratio of 0.92. The stock's fifty day moving average price is $23.29 and its 200-day moving average price is $22.01. The stock has a market capitalization of $129.47 billion, a P/E ratio of -6.20 and a beta of 1.23. Intel has a one year low of $17.67 and a one year high of $32.38.

Intel (NASDAQ:INTC - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The chip maker reported ($0.10) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of $0.01 by ($0.11). The company had revenue of $12.86 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.88 billion. Intel had a negative return on equity of 3.78% and a negative net margin of 38.64%.The firm's quarterly revenue was up .5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.02 EPS. Intel has set its Q3 2025 guidance at 0.000-0.000 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that Intel will post -0.11 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Intel

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.