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INTC, Intel Corporation

Semiconductors capital-intensive Capital build-outCyclical

Intel designs and builds semiconductors — chiefly the microprocessors that serve as the central brains of personal computers and data-center servers, along with related chips. It sells mostly to the makers of computers and servers and to the operators of large data centers, who design their machines around its parts. Unlike most chip designers, Intel also owns the factories that fabricate its chips, so it carries the cost of running and refilling those plants whether or not demand shows up.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

INTC · Intel Corporation

The business

What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.

Revenue · FY2025

$52.9B

−0.5% YoY · −7% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $53.8B 5-yr avg $60.5B

Gross margin 35% 5-yr avg 41%

Operating margin −9.4% 5-yr avg 0.5%

ROIC −3% 5-yr avg 2%

Owner-earnings margin −6% 5-yr avg −13%

Free cash flow margin −6% 5-yr avg −13%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.

Situation: Capital build-out. Capital spending has surged to 28% of sales, today's earnings are charged less depreciation than tomorrow's will be. Cyclical. Margins collapse and recover repeatedly across the record; a single year, good or bad, misstates the through-cycle earning power.
What moves the needle: The question that governs Intel is whether it still holds a real franchise or merely sells a commodity that the market prices for it. A chip earns a premium only if it is faster, cheaper to run, or harder to design out than the alternative; the test is whether buyers keep choosing Intel when a rival offers a comparable part, and whether the price holds when they do. Because Intel owns its fabrication plants, the second test is the cost position — those factories must run full and stay at the front of the manufacturing race, or their fixed cost turns the cycle's lean years into losses and forces reinvestment to be funded with borrowing rather than profit. The bad case is a business that must keep spending heavily to stay in the game while its pricing weakens and its plants run light; watch the margins, the returns on capital, and the debt in the record below to see which way it has gone.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has sat near the cost of capital (median 11%). By owner earnings: roughly 15% of revenue reaches owners as cash, though it swings. The cycle and the balance sheet decide this one; the worst year tells more than the median, and the rest is in the 10-K.

Drafted from the company's filings and reviewed by hand; every number is shown in full in the sections below.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

70% of revenue comes from outside the United States.

Revenue by geography, FY2025

United States30%$15.8B
China24%$12.7B
Singapore18%$9.5B
Taiwan15%$7.7B
Other regions14%$7.2B

From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$59.4B	$62.8B	$70.8B	$72.0B	$77.9B	$79.0B	$63.1B	$54.2B	$53.1B	$52.9B	$53.8B	RevenueRevenue
61%	62%	62%	59%	56%	55%	43%	40%	33%	35%	35%	Gross marginGross mgn
14%	12%	10%	9%	8%	8%	11%	10%	10%	9%	8%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
21%	21%	19%	19%	17%	19%	28%	30%	31%	26%	25%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
$13.1B	$18.1B	$23.3B	$22.0B	$23.7B	$19.5B	$2.3B	$93M	($11.7B)	($2.2B)	($5.0B)	Operating incomeOp. inc.
22.1%	28.8%	32.9%	30.6%	30.4%	24.6%	3.7%	0.2%	−22.0%	−4.2%	−9.4%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$10.3B	$9.6B	$21.1B	$21.0B	$20.9B	$19.9B	$8.0B	$1.7B	($18.8B)	($267M)	($3.2B)	Net incomeNet inc.
20%	53%	10%	13%	17%	8%	-3%	—	—	—	—	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$21.8B	$22.1B	$29.4B	$33.1B	$35.9B	$29.5B	$15.4B	$11.5B	$8.3B	$9.7B	$10.0B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$294M	$177M	$200M	$200M	$10.5B	$10.0B	$11.1B	$7.8B	$10.0B	$10.8B	$11.2B	DepreciationDeprec.
$9.8B	$11.0B	$6.6B	$10.2B	$2.6B	($2.4B)	($6.8B)	($1.3B)	$13.7B	($3.2B)	($451M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$9.6B	$11.8B	$15.2B	$16.2B	$14.3B	$18.7B	$24.8B	$25.8B	$23.9B	$14.6B	$13.1B	CapexCapex
16.2%	18.8%	21.4%	22.5%	18.3%	23.7%	39.4%	47.5%	45.1%	27.7%	24.4%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$12.2B	$10.3B	$14.3B	$16.9B	$21.6B	$10.7B	($9.4B)	($14.3B)	($15.7B)	($4.9B)	($3.1B)	Owner earningsOwner earn.
20.5%	16.5%	20.1%	23.5%	27.7%	13.6%	−14.9%	−26.3%	−29.5%	−9.4%	−5.8%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$12.2B	$10.3B	$14.3B	$16.9B	$21.6B	$10.7B	($9.4B)	($14.3B)	($15.7B)	($4.9B)	($3.1B)	Free cash flowFCF
20.5%	16.5%	20.1%	23.5%	27.7%	13.6%	−14.9%	−26.3%	−29.5%	−9.4%	−5.8%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$15.5B	$14.5B	$190M	$2.0B	$837M	$209M	$681M	$13M	$82M	—	$82M	AcquisitionsAcquis.
$4.9B	$5.1B	$5.5B	$5.6B	$5.6B	$5.6B	$6.0B	$3.1B	$1.6B	$0	$0	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$2.6B	$3.6B	$10.7B	$13.6B	$14.2B	$2.4B	$0	$0	—	—	—	BuybacksBuybacks
12%	10%	22%	19%	18%	14%	2%	0%	-7%	-1%	-3%	ROICROIC
16%	14%	28%	27%	26%	21%	8%	2%	-19%	-0%	-3%	Return on equityROE
8%	7%	21%	20%	19%	15%	2%	−1%	−21%	−0%	−3%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$5.6B	$3.4B	$3.0B	$4.2B	$5.9B	$4.8B	$11.1B	$7.1B	$8.2B	$14.3B	$17.2B	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$4.7B	$5.6B	$6.7B	$7.7B	$6.8B	$9.5B	$4.1B	$3.4B	$3.5B	$3.8B	$4.1B	ReceivablesReceiv.
$5.6B	$7.0B	$7.3B	$8.7B	$8.4B	$10.8B	$13.2B	$11.1B	$12.2B	$11.6B	$12.4B	InventoryInvent.
$2.5B	$2.9B	$3.8B	$4.1B	$5.6B	$5.7B	$9.6B	$8.6B	$12.6B	$9.9B	$7.2B	Accounts payablePayables
$7.8B	$9.7B	$10.2B	$12.3B	$9.6B	$14.5B	$7.8B	$6.0B	$3.1B	$5.6B	$9.3B	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$35.5B	$29.5B	$28.8B	$31.2B	$47.2B	$58.6B	$50.4B	$43.3B	$47.3B	$63.7B	$62.2B	Current assetsCur. assets
$20.3B	$17.4B	$16.6B	$22.3B	$24.8B	$27.5B	$32.2B	$28.1B	$35.7B	$31.6B	$26.9B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
1.7×	1.7×	1.7×	1.4×	1.9×	2.1×	1.6×	1.5×	1.3×	2.0×	2.3×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$14.1B	$24.4B	$24.5B	$26.3B	$27.0B	$27.0B	$27.6B	$27.6B	$24.7B	$23.9B	$20.5B	GoodwillGoodwill
$113.3B	$123.2B	$128.0B	$136.5B	$153.1B	$168.4B	$182.1B	$191.6B	$196.5B	$211.4B	$205.3B	Total assetsAssets
$25.3B	$26.8B	$25.9B	$29.0B	$36.4B	$38.1B	$38.1B	$49.3B	$50.0B	$46.6B	$45.0B	Total debtDebt
$19.7B	$23.3B	$22.8B	$24.8B	$30.5B	$33.3B	$27.0B	$42.2B	$41.8B	$32.3B	$27.8B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
17.9×	27.9×	49.8×	45.1×	37.6×	32.6×	4.7×	0.1×	-11.3×	-2.0×	-4.8×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$66.2B	$69.7B	$74.6B	$77.5B	$81.0B	$95.4B	$101.4B	$105.6B	$99.3B	$114.3B	$111.4B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
2.4%	2.2%	2.2%	2.4%	2.4%	2.6%	5.0%	6.0%	6.4%	4.6%	4.4%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
4.88B	4.83B	4.70B	4.47B	4.23B	4.09B	4.12B	4.21B	4.28B	4.53B	5.08B	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$12.18	$12.98	$15.07	$16.09	$18.40	$19.32	$15.29	$12.87	$12.41	$11.67	$10.58	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$2.12	$1.99	$4.48	$4.71	$4.94	$4.86	$1.94	$0.40	$-4.38	$-0.06	$-0.62	EPS (diluted)EPS
$2.50	$2.14	$3.03	$3.79	$5.11	$2.62	$-2.28	$-3.39	$-3.66	$-1.09	$-0.61	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$2.50	$2.14	$3.03	$3.79	$5.11	$2.62	$-2.28	$-3.39	$-3.66	$-1.09	$-0.61	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
$1.01	$1.05	$1.18	$1.25	$1.32	$1.38	$1.45	$0.73	$0.37	$0.00	$0.00	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$1.97	$2.44	$3.23	$3.62	$3.37	$4.58	$6.03	$6.11	$5.59	$3.23	$2.58	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$13.58	$14.41	$15.86	$17.33	$19.15	$23.32	$24.60	$25.07	$23.19	$25.23	$21.92	Book value / shareBVPS

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	−0.5%/yr	−8.7%/yr
Capital spending / share	+5.6%/yr	−0.8%/yr
Book value / share	+7.1%/yr	+5.7%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.

Share count

4.5Bpeak FY2016

ROIC

−1%low FY2024

Gross margin

35%low FY2024

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

3.1×peak FY2021

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

The accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.

($4.9B)owner earningsvs.($267M)net incomelow FY2024

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cash

Each year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.

FY2016FY2025

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2021–FY2025cash-flow statement, SEC EDGAR →

Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.

In fiscal 2025 the business reported a $267M loss but ($4.9B) of owner earnings: $4.7B less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	($267M)	($18.8B)	$1.7B	$8.0B	$19.9B
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$10.8B	+$10.0B	+$7.8B	+$11.1B	+$10.0B
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$2.4B	+$3.4B	+$3.2B	+$3.1B	+$2.0B
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$3.2B	+$13.7B	−$1.3B	−$6.8B	−$2.4B
Cash from operations	$9.7B	$8.3B	$11.5B	$15.4B	$29.5B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$14.6B	−$23.9B	−$25.8B	−$24.8B	−$18.7B
Owner earnings	($4.9B)	($15.7B)	($14.3B)	($9.4B)	$10.7B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	-9%	-29%	-26%	-15%	14%

Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the capital it must spend to hold its position . The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $2.4B), owner earnings is nearer ($7.4B).

Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? -2.0×

Does not cover its interest

Operating income ($2.2B) ÷ interest expense $1.1B

What this means
A full year of operating profit didn't cover the interest bill. This is the zombie zone: the business depends on refinancing, asset sales, or forbearance to service its debt.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $32.3B

Net debt against an operating loss

Cash $14.3B − debt $46.6B

What this means
Netting $14.3B of cash and short-term investments against $46.6B of debt leaves $32.3B owed, with no operating profit this year to measure it against — understand that combination before anything else about the company. Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
How long is cash tied up? 45d

Tight

DSO 27 + DIO 123 − DPO 105 days

What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. Lower is better; a long cycle means growth itself eats cash.

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 10%

Solid through the cycle

10-yr median, range -7%–22%; -1% latest = NOPAT ($1.1B) ÷ invested capital $146.6B

Industry peers: median 10%

What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 10 years (it ran -1% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.
Owner-earnings margin 14%

Solid through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range -29%–28%; latest ($4.9B) = operating cash $9.7B − maintenance capex $14.6B

Industry peers: median 6%

What this means
What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's -9% of revenue this year, a 14% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $2.4B of SBC) leaves ($7.4B).
Are earnings backed by cash? $9.7B

Loss, but cash-generative

Net income ($267M) · cash from operations $9.7B

What this means
The company reported a net loss, so a conversion ratio isn't meaningful. What matters then is whether operations still threw off cash, here, they did.

How is the cash used?

Where do the earnings go? —

No surplus to allocate

What this means
The business didn't generate positive Owner Earnings this year, so any distributions came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not from operations.
Investing or harvesting? 1.36×

Expanding

Capex $14.6B ÷ depreciation $10.8B

What this means
Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.

Graham’s defensive tests · 2 of 6 met

Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.

Adequate size Pass

Revenue ≥ $2B · $52.9B

What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.
Strong liquidity Pass

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 2.02×

What this means
Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.
Conservative debt Near

Debt ≤ working capital · $46.6B vs $32.1B WC

What this means
Graham's rule that borrowings not exceed net current assets. Capital-heavy and buyback-heavy firms routinely fail it, read it next to interest coverage, not alone.
Earnings stability Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 2 loss years

What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
Dividend record Near

Uninterrupted dividends · 9 of 10 yrs

What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.
Earnings growth Miss

Earnings +33% over the record · −142%

What this means
At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.
Moderate price —

P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price

What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $-1.15/share (latest year $-0.05), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $22.74/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2016–2025

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

Profitable years 8 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 2 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 3 of 10 yrs

What this means
A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.
Operating margin 28% → −9% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin slipped — about 28% early to −9% lately, median 22% — competition or costs are biting in.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC −32%

What this means
Reinvested capital came back at a negative incremental return over this window — the invested base grew while operating profit did not. The filings show where it went.
Worst year 2024 · −22.0% op. margin

What this means
Operations went underwater in 2024, understand why before trusting the good years.
Share count −0.8%/yr

What this means
The share count is shrinking, buybacks are quietly growing your slice of the business.
Dividend record paid

What this means
Paid a dividend in 9 of the years on record.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Low contestability

The moat is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded, the kind AI cuts costs within but does not contest.

In its own filing A competitive risk, new this year

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat, in language that was not in the prior year's filing.

“Our competitive environment has intensified in recent years, and we expect it to continue to do so in the future, including as a result of the proliferation of AI and high demand for AI-related products and services.”

AI is unlikely to contest a moat that is physical, regulated or balance-sheet-funded; here it reads more as a cost tool than a threat.

Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

Current Position

as of the latest quarter, Mar 28, 2026

Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.

Current assets$62.2B

Cash & short-term investments$17.2B
Receivables$4.1B
Inventory$12.4B
Other current assets$28.4B

Current liabilities$26.9B

Debt due within a year$2.0B
Accounts payable$7.2B
Other current liabilities$17.7B

Current ratio2.31×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio1.85×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.64×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$35.3Bthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$2.0B due · $17.2B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Mar 28, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+7.2%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.6× → 2.3×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value$88.2Bequity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Debt incl. operating leases$45.0Bno operating-lease liability tagged this quarter, so debt alone

Deferred revenue$185Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

Debt maturity

the debt note, SEC EDGAR →

Not how much it owes, but when it falls due, and against what. The ladder the company files, beside cash on hand and a year's owner earnings.

'26$2.5B

'27$3.8B

'28$3.2B

'29$3.3B

'30$2.8B

'31$31.7B

Bars scaled to the largest single year.

Due in the next 12 months$2.5Bthe first rung: what must be repaid or rolled over within the year

Within two years$6.3Bthe near wall, the part most exposed to today’s credit conditions

Biggest single year$31.7Bin 2031the lumpiest maturity, where a refinancing, if needed, is largest

Due over the next five years$47.2Bthe near slice; the balance sheet carries $46.6B of debt in all

Against what the business has and earns

Cash & short-term investments, Mar 28, 2026$17.2B

Together, against $2.5B due next year6.9×

Cash on hand as of Mar 28, 2026 comes to $17.2B against the $2.5B due in the twelve months after the Dec 27, 2025 schedule: 6.9 times it.

Maturity schedule extracted from the company’s Dec 27, 2025 annual report and reconciled to the total the table states.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $216.7B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a reinvestor, most operating cash is plowed back into the business.

Reinvested$175.0B · 81%
Dividends$43.0B · 20%
Buybacks$47.2B · 22%

Returned to owners$90.2B
216% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $43.0B as dividends and $47.2B as buybacks.
Source of funding−$48.4B
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $48.4B beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet: debt rose from $25.3B to $45.0B.
Average price paid for buybacks—
Buybacks ran $47.2B over the span, but the filings don't tag the share count needed to deduce the average price paid.
Net change in share count4.3%
The diluted count rose from 4875M to 5083M: issuance (stock pay, deals) outran any buybacks, so owners were diluted on net.
Dividend record$0.00/sh
Paid in 9 of the years on record. It was cut at least once along the way.
Return on what it retained—
Not read here: owner earnings are negative over the span, or the company returned nearly all its earnings rather than retaining them, so there is too little retained to measure a return on.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 10-year cash-flow record

Goodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.

Goodwill & intangibles$26.7B13% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity21%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$33.9Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $175.0B of capital spent building

$3.0B written down across 1 year (2024): goodwill the company has already conceded it overpaid for, charged against earnings. A write-down costs no cash (the cash went out when the deal was signed), but it is management marking its own past judgment to market.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 10-year record, from the company's own filings.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid.

CEO pay ratio812:1
What the chief earns for every dollar the median employee makes, per the 2026 proxy. A high ratio alone settles nothing; some businesses are genuinely top-heavy in scarce skill. A runaway figure is where Buffett starts asking whether the board is doing its job.
Stock-based compensation$2.4B
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 5% of revenue. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why Intel Corporation is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2016–2025.

5 of the 6 tests turned up something to look into; the other 1 came back clean.

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?−21.7% vs 19.0%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 19.0% early in the record and −21.7% across the last three years, and the latest year has not recovered. Ask the filing whether that is a structural drift or a cyclical trough — price, mix, cost, or a competitor — and whether it is permanent.
Look hereDid the share count rise anyway?4.3%
Diluted shares grew 4.3% over 2016–2025, even as the company spent $47.2B on buybacks. The repurchases were outrun by issuance — to staff, in a raise, or in a deal — and the filing says which; owners' slice still shrank. Read the buyback line beside this one, not on its own.
Look hereDid debt outgrow the business?$25.3B → $45.0B
Debt rose from $25.3B to $45.0B while owner earnings went from about $12.3B to ($11.6B): the borrowing grew and the earnings that would carry it are not there now. Debt raised for buybacks or deals rather than growth is the kind that bites in a downturn.
Look hereDid receivables and inventory outpace sales?17% → 31% of sales
Receivables and inventory grew from $10.2B to $16.5B while revenue grew −9%: working capital is climbing faster than sales (17% of revenue then, 31% now). That can mean customers paying slower, stock building up, or revenue pulled forward. The filing's cash-flow and receivables notes say which.
Look hereAre "one-time" charges a yearly habit?6 of 10 years
Management took an impairment or write-down in 6 of the last 10 years, $7.6B in all. Taken across the majority of the record, the "one-time" label is wearing thin — ask whether these are past deals coming due rather than genuinely isolated events. Read it beside the goodwill the company still carries.

And these came back clean

Did reported profit become cash?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

Peers, Semiconductors

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.

Company	Revenue	Gross margin	Op. margin	ROIC	Owner earn. margin
INTCIntel Corporation	$52.9B	56%	23.4%	11%	15%
GEGE Aerospace	$45.9B	36%	-2.2%	-2%	6%
QCOMQUALCOMM Incorporated	$44.3B	57%	27.1%	28%	26%
GEVGE Vernova Inc.	$38.1B	16%	-0.7%	-3%	3%
MUMicron Technology Inc.	$37.4B	39%	24.4%	15%	20%
TXNTexas Instruments Incorporated	$17.7B	64%	40.7%	35%	35%
AMKRAmkor Technology	$6.7B	17%	7.5%	10%	6%
FSLRFirst Solar	$5.2B	23%	8.9%	5%	4%
Group median	—	37%	16.1%	11%	10%

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what Intel Corporation has delivered.

Intel Corporation’s latest year shows negative owner earnings, a cyclical trough. So the tool opens on the through-cycle base, the cash it would earn at rest; clear the toggle below to read the latest year exactly as reported.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, Intel Corporation earns about $7.9B on its 15.0% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s −9.4% margin runs below that; the reported figure may understate a lean year. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($7.9B) Net of stock comp (−$2.4B)

—

The assumptions Required return 9% Years of high growth 10 Terminal growth 2.5%

9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.

Enter a price above to run it.

Implied by the price—

Owner-earnings growth, delivered—

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)—

P/B—

Graham’s price gate—

Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.

Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.

Owner earnings ($3.1B) on 5026M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-17; net debt $27.8B. The base opens on the through-cycle figure (the latest year sits off the record’s own median, and Graham’s averaging cuts both ways); clear Normalize to use the year as filed. Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh INTC against another business →

The owners of INTC: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "Intel Corporation (INTC), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/INTC, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← INTA its page in the Manual INTU →

Industry order: ← INDI the Semiconductors chapter IPGP →