The Zhitong Finance App notes that after the recent Asian survey was completed, the investment bank KeyBanc adjusted the ratings of several chip stocks. The bank downgraded SWKS.US (SWKS.US)'s stock rating from “excessive holdings” to “the same level as the market,” while also raising the target prices for several chip stocks, including Nvidia (NVDA.US) and Intel (INTC.US).
A team of analysts led by John Wayne said, “After our recent trip to Asia, we revised several companies' performance forecasts and target prices. The topic receiving the most attention is that the continued strong demand for data centers is having a broad cross-cutting impact on the semiconductor industry as a whole, supporting continued shortages of memory chips, further price increases, and tightening supply conditions, which has also brought forward the lead time for personal computers (PCs) and flagship smartphones. We have seen analog chips perform better than expected. Driven by data center and industrial demand, delivery cycles have been extended, leading to widespread price increases and order volume improvements, thus maintaining the upward trend in the early stages of this cycle.”
Analysts added that judging from individual stock findings, their research results are most beneficial to Intel, MW (MRVL.US), and Micron (MU.US); they are positive for AMD (AMD.US), Bandai Semiconductors (MPWR.US), Adderall Semiconductors ADI.US), Microchip Technology (MCHP.US), NXP Semiconductors (NXPI.US), and Texas Instruments (TXN.US); while Cisco, Inc. and Texas Instruments (TXN.US) have a positive attitude Weixun United Semiconductor ( QRVO.US) and Hillace Technology (CRUS.US) are pessimistic.
Intel
KeyBanc raised Intel's price target from $110 to $155 while maintaining the “Overweight” rating.
Wen and his team said, “The positive factors include: 1) In view of the strong smart AI trend, demand for server CPUs is still extremely large, and Intel has successfully expanded the production capacity of the Intel 3 process to support a 25% to 30% increase in server shipments this year and over 50% growth next year. 2) The yield of the 18A process continues to improve significantly, rising from 65% in the previous quarter to over 85%. 3) In light of improved yield and successful customer designs, we are seeing signs that Intel plans to significantly expand 18A production capacity. We believe that in addition to Apple, Intel has successfully secured design collaborations with AMD, Nvidia, Mywell Technology, Microsoft, Micron, and OpenAI.”
Additionally, analysts said that in addition to Google's TPU Humu Fish, Intel has also secured its second major design collaboration on EMIB-T packaging technology with Amazon's AWS Trainium 3 chip. Another positive factor is increasing the price of client CPUs by 6% to 15% in the third quarter of 2026.
Nvidia
The agency raised the price target for Nvidia shares from $310 to $330, maintaining an “overweight” rating.
Analysts said their findings were mixed for Nvidia, but the overall bias was positive. There appears to be a slight delay in the mass production process of the Vera Rubin architecture, and due to issues with the cooling roof and delays in SK Hynix's verification on the HBM4, Rubin's mass production momentum appears to have moderated slightly. However, analysts pointed out that the risk to performance forecasting is minimal because they expect Nvidia to ship more B300 GPUs to replace the R200. The analyst added that the positive factors include Nvidia's increase in chip wafer substrate package (CoWoS) supply to 1.1 million wafers in 2027 (a 69% increase), which reflects strong demand, and the majority of shipments are expected to be Rubin, which Rubin Ultra is expected to contribute in part in late 2027.
arm
KeyBanc raised Arm's price target from $300 to $430, maintaining the “Overweight” rating.
The analyst said, “Although the short-term demand trend for Arm is mixed, and we expect the smartphone market to continue to shrink due to a shortage of memory chips, this impact is being offset by surging demand for intelligent AI, which is driving strong demand for Arm-based server CPUs from Nvidia (Vera), Amazon AWS (Graviton), and Google (Axion).”
Wen and his team pointed out that although they think short-term performance predictions may be risky, they ultimately believe that as Arm starts building server CPU chips for customers, the long-term opportunities surrounding server CPUs will be an even more significant and far-reaching opportunity for Arm. Analysts believe that as Arm begins manufacturing chips, its goal of achieving $25 billion in revenue and over $9 per share (EPS) in fiscal year 2031 is within reach.
Sijiaxun
The agency downgraded Sijiaxun's stock rating from an “increase in holdings” to “the same as the general market”, and lowered its performance forecasts for Sijiaxun and Weixun Joint Semiconductors (Qorvo).
In October 2025, Cisco, which supplies RF chips to Apple and other smartphone manufacturers, announced plans to acquire Weixun United Semiconductor (Qorvo) through cash plus shares. The deal valued the merged company at approximately $22 billion.
Analysts said they downgraded the Sijiaxun rating for the following three reasons:
First, analysts said that their original assumption when they raised the stock to “increase their holdings” no longer holds true. The analyst said, “We initially upgraded Sijiaxun to 'overfit' in October 2025, based on its pending acquisition of Weixun United Semiconductors. At the time, we expected this to generate significant cost and revenue synergies, of which the cost synergy was estimated to be over $500 million. However, this presupposes a stable smartphone market environment, and assumes that the merged company is in a more favorable position to compete for Apple's share of sockets (sockets). While we still believe this, the benefits from the new content are likely to be offset by the shrinking overall addressable market (TAM).”
Second, Wen and his team pointed out that the smartphone market continues to deteriorate, and all market segments, including Apple, Samsung, and Chinese manufacturers, and all original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are cutting orders.
Finally, analysts said that although the stock may have an attractive risk-reward ratio, they think it will be difficult for the stock price to perform when the market shrinks, because 60% of the company's revenue after the merger comes from smartphones.
Other target price changes
KeyBanc also raised its price targets for the following stocks and maintained an “overbearing” rating: Micron raised its price target from $1,600 to $1,750; Maywell Technology raised it from $385 to $400; and AMD raised it from $530 to $725.
Meanwhile, the agency lowered Hillace Tech's price target from $200 to $190, but retained the stock's “overbearing” rating.