Stifel believes that Intel (INTC) may be looking to buy Altera (ALTR) to prevent it from moving to buying chips from Taiwan Semiconductor Mfg (TSM) instead of from Intel as it presently does. The firm says that if Intel lost Altera as a customer, Intel's ability to win another flagship foundry customer could be hindered. Stifel thinks that Ibntel's potential foundry customers may have noticed this situation, and the firm says that this would not be "an ideal reason" for an acquisition. It keeps a $36 price target and Buy rating on Intel.

Cantor Fitzgerald lowered the firm's price target on Intel to $40 from $45 and keeps a Neutral rating on the shares. Intel's report was not "ideal," and 1H24 trends are coming in worse than expected on broad-based weakness, resulting in a miss on the Q2 guidance, the analyst tells investors in a research note. The good news is that management reiterated its view for year over year growth in calendar 2024, implying a meaningful inflection in the back half of the year, the firm says. While Cantor continues to pull for Intel as the National Champion, the firm remains on the sidelines awaiting greater conviction on the reclaiming of market leadership across the company's various offerings.

Apple (AAPL) supplier TSMC (TSM) has unveiled its A16 chip manufacturing technology featuring nanosheet transistors with "backside power rails" meant for producing its ultra-advanced 1.6nm chips by 2026, Nikkei Asia's Cheng Ting-Fang reports. TSMC says the introduction of the technology can "greatly improve logic density and performance." Reference Link

Citi lowered the firm's price target on Intel to $35 from $40 and keeps a Neutral rating on the shares. Intel reported decent results but guided below consensus as strength from the PC end market was throttled by an issue in wafer assembly, the analyst tells investors in a research note. Citi's checks indicate Intel is on track to draw even with TSMC in manufacturing sometime next year, which is a positive. However, the company is guiding for well above seasonal growth in the second half of 2024, adds the firm.

Check out this evening's top movers from around Wall Street, compiled by The Fly. HIGHER AFTER EARNINGSSnap (SNAP) up... To see the rest of the story go to thefly.com. See Story Here

Pre-earnings options volume in Intel is normal with calls leading puts 2:1. Implied volatility suggests the market is anticipating a move near 5.6%, or $1.96, after results are released. Median move over the past eight quarters is 7.8%.

Intel (INTC) is scheduled to report results of its fiscal first quarter after the market close on April 25, with a conference call scheduled for 5:00 pm ET. What to watch... To see the rest of the story go to thefly.com. See Story Here

Ansys (ANSS) announced a collaboration with TSMC (TSM) on multiphysics software for TSMC's Compact Universal Photonic Engines. COUPE is a cutting-edge Silicon Photonics integration system and Co-Packaged Optics platform that mitigates coupling loss while significantly accelerating chip-to-chip and machine-to-machine communication. TSMC COUPE, along with Ansys multiphysics solutions that are integrated with Synopsys' 3DIC Compiler unified exploration-to-signoff platform, enables the next generation of silicon photonics and co-packaged optics designs for applications in AI, datacenter, cloud, and HPC communications. The work spans multiple areas, including fiber-to-chip coupling, integrated electronic-photonic chip design, power integrity verification, high-frequency electromagnetic analysis, and critical thermal management.