Daddy Trump Lures Intel Into Bed For $9 Billion… Beijing Cries Into Its Semiconductors

Well, well, well… look who’s spooning now. 

Intel will apparently do whatever it takes to catch up to Nvidia and TSMC in the chip race. This time, it slid into bed with Daddy Donnie and Uncle Sam for a $9 billion corporate cuddle. And in true “wtf did he just say” fashion, the announcement came with Trump blurting out (on camera) that he’s got nice legs and wants to play FIFA soccer. Yes, really. That happened. (I, too, say things like that before nationalizing a semiconductor company.)

Anyway, back to the chips. On Friday, Trump stood in the Oval Office… mid-rant about being athletic and possibly World Cup material… and spilled the beans: the U.S. government will be taking a 10% equity stake in Intel, the struggling American chipmaker currently trying to reinvent itself.

(Source: NBC News)

“They’ve agreed to do it,” Trump said of the deal, with the same energy as my dad announcing he talked the car dealership into free floor mats. “I think it’s a great deal for them.” (I mean… he did write “The Art of the Deal”).

Now, if you’re thinking “wait, is that even allowed?” welcome to the new era of U.S. industrial policy, where Uncle Sam isn’t content just writing checks… he wants shares. The money in question comes from the CHIPS Act (thanks Uncle Joe), which was originally designed to revive domestic chip manufacturing after the U.S. realized that 99% of our most advanced semiconductors are made 80 miles from China.

Remember, Intel’s been a major beneficiary of that sweet CHIPS cash… with $11 billion in grants already lined up. But Trump’s crew isn’t about to hand that over like a stimmy check. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the quiet part out loud: “We should get an equity stake for our money.”

So, Intel gets the funding it so desperately needs (more on that mess in a second), and the government gets 10% ownership… non-voting, but still. The feds are now on the cap table. Imagine the U.S. Treasury showing up on Intel’s next earnings call like, “Yeah, we have a few notes.”

Oh, and just for a quick reminder, SoftBank (the same crew behind WeWork’s “rise and flameout” story) also bought up a $2 billion stake in Intel. So between that and the White House buy-in, it’s hard to call Intel an underdog anymore.

But I don’t think this is just about one company. It’s about the U.S. not wanting to be one diplomatic spat away from losing access to advanced semiconductors. And Intel (despite flopping more times than a soccer player in the box) is still the only American company that could build those advanced chips onshore. The Ohio mega-fab is still in the works… though delayed until 2030 (which, in chip years, is like saying "coming soon-ish").

Oh yeah… Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan (the same guy Trump literally demanded resign two weeks ago over his past ties to Chinese investments) flew to D.C., met with Trump, and apparently charmed his way into a deal. Trump said he liked him, called him “somewhat a victim,” and then offered to become a 10% partner (maybe he complimented Ivanka’s dress or something). Whatever happened, you have to admit that Trump’s presidency plays out better than most Hollywood movies nowadays… you never know what’s coming next.

(Source: ABC News)

As a result, Intel stock spiked nearly 10% before cooling off and closing up around 5%. It wasn’t exactly meme-stock mania, but for once the market treated Intel like a real company instead of just the setup to an Nvidia roast.

But let’s not gloss over the obvious here: this is weird territory. The U.S. government hasn’t really done the whole “own part of a tech company” thing… well, ever (bailouts don’t count…those were just glorified loans with PR spin). Taking an actual equity stake is a big shift. It blurs the line between public and private, and raises the real question: if this works, who’s next? Nvidia? AMD? A GoFundMe so Reddit traders can finally buy TikTok?

For Intel, though, this is a true “make or break” moment. They’ve missed wave after wave… blew their shot in mobile, showed up late to GPUs, and botched process technology so badly that they’re years behind rivals on advanced nodes. They’ve been chasing the AI boom like that one friend who always “shows up late but swears he’s on the way.” Now they’ve got cash, partners, and pressure… a lot of pressure. And if they fumble this bag, it won’t just be embarrassing for Intel… it’ll be a political nightmare, an economic mess, and a TikTok finance meme waiting to happen. (“When the gov owns 10% of your bags, but you still can’t beat Jensen Huang.”)

It’s kind of crazy to think that we’re all now kind of invested in Intel… even if you don’t own a single share. If the deal goes through, your tax dollars are literally riding shotgun with SoftBank. (And if this is how the U.S. starts investing, someone tell them about Costco and Apple while we’re at it.)

At the time of publishing this article, Stocks.News holds positions in Intel and Apple as mentioned in the article.