AMD hasn't reported anything yet. It does that on Tuesday, after the market closes, with a call to analysts at 5 p.m. Eastern. But the shares have already had a rough few weeks. They closed Monday at $466.84, after falling 7.52 percent that day and 10.88 percent on Friday, FinanceFeeds reported. In October they set a record above $658. Monday's close is about 29 percent below it.
This is a preview, not a report: every expectation below is someone else's, and the real figures come after the close. It is also a strange setup. AMD is expected to report what would be its biggest quarter yet, in the middle of one of the worst stretches chip stocks have had in years. Monday's fall came "without any AMD news," FinanceFeeds noted. Here is what the company has promised, what Wall Street is looking for, who it is up against, and what has been happening around it.
What Wall Street expects
AMD set the bar itself in August. Its earnings release said: "For the third quarter of 2026, AMD expects revenue to be approximately $13 billion, plus or minus $300 million." It also forecast an adjusted gross margin of about 56%. The second quarter's revenue was $11.5 billion, up 50%.
Analysts sit just above that. TipRanks puts the consensus at adjusted earnings of $1.95 a share, against $1.20 a year earlier, on revenue of $13.10 billion, FinanceFeeds reported. The data center business, which sells server processors and AI chips, is expected at $8.19 billion, up 88 percent. The PC business is expected above $3.06 billion, and gaming at $655 million, down 49 percent. AMD has a habit of clearing these: Barchart reported that it has been "meeting or surpassing consensus estimates in each of the past four quarters."
The forecast for the current quarter may matter more than the results. FinanceFeeds wrote that "management’s fourth-quarter outlook could have a greater influence on the share-price reaction." Finance chief Jean Hu said in August: "We expect Data Center sales to accelerate in the second half of 2026, driving stronger overall revenue growth and continued earnings expansion." Tuesday's results test that sentence.
Source: SEC EDGAR XBRL data
Traders are braced for a big move
Options prices show how far traders think a stock could swing. As of Monday, estimates of AMD's implied move in either direction ran from 8.3 percent per EarningsWatcher to 10.85 percent per Benzinga Pro, FinanceFeeds reported. That is the market's own measure of uncertainty, not a prediction of which way it goes, and it isn't ours.
Analysts are split on where the shares should be. The TipRanks average price target is $665.86, from 30 Buy and six Hold ratings, according to FinanceFeeds. But targets are moving around. Morgan Stanley's Joseph Moore, who rates the shares Hold, has a target of $510. He expects server chip strength to offset weakness in PCs, though he warned that supply limits could cap near-term growth and stayed cautious on AMD's AI chips against Nvidia, FinanceFeeds reported. BMO Capital's Harsh Kumar, who rates them Buy with a target of $550, expects margins to come under pressure in the near term as AMD scales up its AI business.
Who AMD is up against
AMD fights on two fronts, and each rival has lately given investors something to think about. In AI chips, it is the challenger. Silicon Analysts says Nvidia holds "approximately 80%" of the AI accelerator market, with AMD "capturing roughly 5–7% market share." Futurum Group's figures, reported by Yellow.com, are starker: Nvidia "over 95% of data center GPUs, leaving AMD with roughly 4.5%." The two count different things, and no one outside these companies has exact numbers.
AMD's answer is Helios, its first full rack of AI hardware, which its release says "is being deployed by leading AI labs and cloud providers including Anthropic, Cirrascale, HUMAIN, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, Oracle, Tensorwave, Vultr and others." The bet is large. OpenAI and Meta have each signed deals under which "each customer intends to deploy up to 6 gigawatts of AMD data center GPUs," the 10-Q says. To win them, AMD gave each a warrant for up to 160 million shares at $0.01 a share, "vesting in tranches tied to AMD Instinct GPU purchase milestones and specified AMD stock price and/or performance conditions." In other words, part of what AMD offered those customers was its own stock.
The doubts are about software as much as chips. Neil Shah of Counterpoint Research "called the Helios silicon on par with Nvidia's chips, arguing the real fight sits in software," Yellow.com reported. Futurum's chief executive, Daniel Newman, "sees room for AMD to capture 20% to 25% of the market."
In PCs and servers, the rival is Intel, and AMD's filing doesn't hide how it feels: "Intel Corporation (Intel) uses its microprocessor market position to price its products aggressively and target our customers and channel partners with special incentives." Intel started the latest slide. Its finance chief said last week that the PC slowdown would last "at least through the first half of next year," and its shares fell sharply. Gartner's preliminary estimate, reported by FinanceFeeds, has PC shipments down 22.4% in the third quarter. AMD is less exposed: "MarketWatch noted that PCs account for more than half of Intel’s expected revenue exposure, compared with less than a quarter for AMD." But its PC business brought in $3.1 billion last quarter, so it isn't immune. We covered that side of the story on Friday.
A market that has turned on chips
The fall isn't only about AMD. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index closed Monday 29.4% below its June record, according to 24/7 Wall St., while the S&P 500 was only about 3.6% below its October record, Trading and Investment News reported. Chip stocks lost more than $400 billion of market value on Monday alone, and "About 7 in 10 S&P 500 stocks rose on Monday, but nearly every chip stock fell," FinanceFeeds reported. It said AMD has lost about $298 billion in value since October 6, and that chip and memory stocks together have lost about $3.7 trillion.
The reasons people give are bigger than any one company. News reports point to higher interest rates and to doubts about who pays for the AI buildout. "If the buyers of chips have to borrow to keep spending, chip demand depends on credit markets staying open," Trading and Investment News wrote, citing Protos' count of at least $214 billion borrowed by large AI spenders this year. Bank of America's Sebastian Raedler warned that "most major capital cycles of the past have ended in disappointment, even though the underlying technology often lived up to expectations," 24/7 Wall St. reported. Broadcom's chief executive, Hock Tan, said "a lot of investors have no clue what they are investing in," The Silicon Review reported. Not everyone is selling: Stock Trader's Almanac editor Jeff Hirsch "said he bought the 30 October selloff," FinanceFeeds reported. These are the explanations and views others have offered. We don't know why any one investor sold.
Source: SEC EDGAR XBRL data
What to watch after the close
This is analysis, not advice, and we make no call on the shares. Three things in Tuesday's release will say the most about the business.
- Data centers. Does the segment come in near $8.19 billion, and does AMD's forecast show the acceleration Hu promised? Last quarter it was $6.7 billion, up 107%.
- PCs. Does AMD's outlook look like Intel's? If it holds up better, that suggests AMD is taking share. If it matches, the whole market is shrinking.
- Margins. Does the gross margin forecast stay near 56%? Selling complete AI racks could bring in more revenue at thinner margins, the pressure BMO's Kumar described.
More figures are on AMD's company page. A stock can fall this far on what is happening around a company. On Tuesday, for the first time in weeks, the company gets to speak for itself.