Intel Corp. (NASDAQ:$INTC) shares have increased by nearly 26% year-to-date, performing roughly in line the NASDAQ index. While the company’s shares underperformed the index for most of the year, Intel’s strong earnings report last month was able to rejuvenate investors’ confidence in the company.
Intel shares are still quite cheap. Intel currently projects that it’ll generate $2.93 in earnings per share this year, meaning that as of the stock’s Nov 10th closing price of $45.58, investors are paying about 15.56 times this year’s expected earnings per share for the stock.
Let’s address the elephant in the room: Why is Intel stock so cheap?
Generally speaking, the higher a company’s price-to-earnings ratio, the more optimistic investors are about that company’s ability to grow. Analysts expect Intel’s earnings per share to grow to just $3 per share in 2018, and then to $3.19 in 2019. Revenue growth is also expected to be underwhelming as well; the average revenue growth estimates for 2018 and 2019 are 2.69% and 3.22%, respectively.
Since analysts- and by extension, investors- don’t expect much earnings growth, the amount they’re willing to pay for each dollar of Intel’s earnings is necessarily going to be slow.
Further, there are two big assumptions underlying Intel’s revenue growth projections. The first being, that the personal computer chip business will decline at a “low-single-digit” percentage rate. The second, that the company’s non-personal computer chip businesses, will see a “double-digit revenue growth in aggregate.”
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