Former U.S. President Donald Trump expressed regret over not negotiating for a larger stake in Intel during a deal that resulted in the U.S. government acquiring a 9.9% ownership in the company. In an interview with Fortune, Trump recounted a conversation with Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan, where he initially requested a 10% stake for free, to which Tan agreed.
Trump remarked, "S---, I should have asked for more," reflecting on the potential impact of stronger government support for Intel. He claimed that if he had been in office to impose tariffs on foreign chip manufacturers, Intel would have dominated the market, potentially surpassing TSMC, which currently has a market capitalization of $1.84 trillion compared to Intel's $547 billion.
The U.S. government's investment in Intel, which included $5.7 billion from the CHIPS Act and $3.2 billion from other awards, has coincided with a significant recovery in Intel's stock, which has risen over 300%.
Recent developments include a preliminary agreement for Intel to produce chips for Apple devices and Tesla's Elon Musk indicating plans to utilize Intel chips for his $119 billion Terafab project. April marked a record month for Intel on the Nasdaq, with its stock more than doubling amid a resurgence in demand for its central processing units (CPUs).
Bank of America forecasts that the CPU market could more than double by 2030, and Nvidia has noted that CPUs are becoming a bottleneck for AI development. Tan emphasized the renewed importance of CPUs in the AI era, stating that demand for Intel's data center CPUs currently exceeds supply