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Intel reported Q1 adjusted EPS of $0.29 vs. $0.01 consensus on revenue of $13.6B (vs. $12.36B expected), driven by surging AI server CPU demand. The Data Center & AI unit posted $5.1B in revenue, up 22% YoY. Q2 guidance of $13.8B–$14.8B also crushed the $13.03B estimate. The stock closed at $82.36 on 264M shares (147% above average), lifting the entire semiconductor complex.
Alphabet disclosed a massive deal: $10B upfront in cash at a $350B valuation, plus up to $30B more tied to performance targets. Google Cloud is also committing 5+ GW of compute to Anthropic over five years. This comes days after Amazon announced its own expanded $5B (up to $25B total) Anthropic investment. The two deals together signal Anthropic's emergence as the primary AI arms-race asset. GOOGL closed +1.4% at $342.32.
Nvidia closed at a record $208.27, up 4.3%, pushing its market cap past $5T for the first time since October. The stock added over $200B in a single session, fueled by Intel's earnings-driven semiconductor rally and positioning ahead of hyperscaler earnings next week. NVDA is now $1T ahead of the second-largest company by market cap (Alphabet).
Meta announced it will lay off approximately 8,000 employees beginning May 20 and leave 6,000 open positions unfilled — the largest cut since 2023. The move is explicitly tied to redirecting capital toward AI infrastructure, with 2026 capex projected at $115B–$135B. Despite the layoff news, META closed up 2.5% at $675.49, with investors reading it as a bullish efficiency signal.
AMD rode the Intel-driven semiconductor wave to close at $347.77, up 13.85%. D.A. Davidson upgraded AMD to Buy with a $375 price target, arguing Intel's AI CPU traction validates that x86 remains central to the AI buildout and AMD is positioned to capture share via EPYC server chips and Instinct AI accelerators. AMD's most recent Data Center revenue was a record $5.38B (+39% YoY).
Microsoft is offering buyouts to employees whose age plus tenure equals 70+, potentially affecting ~8,750 workers. The stock is down 15% YTD and slipped ~5% on Thursday. Combined with Meta's cuts, over 20,000 Big Tech jobs were announced in a single day, raising concerns about an AI-driven labor restructuring. MSFT closed at $424.53, up 2.1% on Friday's broader rally.
Amazon invested an additional $5B in Anthropic at a $380B valuation on April 20, with up to $20B more contingent on milestones — bringing total committed capital to ~$33B. In return, Anthropic committed to $100B+ in AWS spending over 10 years including Trainium custom chips. AMZN closed at $263.93, up 3.5% on the broader tech rally.
Tesla posted Q1 EPS of $0.41 vs. $0.37 expected. The bigger news: Tesla announced a semiconductor fabrication partnership with Intel (using 14A process) for its "Terafab" facility, and said large-scale Optimus factory prep begins in Q2 with a target of 1M robots/year. 2026 capex guided to $25B+, with negative FCF expected for the rest of the year. TSLA rose 7–8% on the week.
ServiceNow beat on EPS ($0.97 vs. $0.96) and revenue ($3.77B vs. $3.74B), but the stock dropped 14–17% after flagging delayed large on-premise deals in the Middle East. The AI story remained strong: AI-specific commitments guidance raised to $1.5B (up 50%), Now Assist customers spending $1M+ grew 130% YoY, and subscription revenue guidance was raised to $15.74B–$15.78B.
Cerebras Systems re-filed its S-1 on April 17 after scrapping its 2025 IPO attempt, targeting a mid-May listing on Nasdaq under ticker CBRS. The company is now profitable: $87.9M net income on $510M revenue in 2025 (revenue +76% YoY, vs. a $485M loss in 2024). Key partnerships include a $20B compute deal with OpenAI and a deployment agreement with AWS. Morgan Stanley, Citi, Barclays, and UBS are underwriting.
