New York, Feb 26, 2026, 5:06 PM EST — After-hours
- AMD shares slipped 3.41% to finish at $203.68, following a broader pullback in semiconductor names after Nvidia’s earnings release.
- AMD’s fresh multi-year AI chip deal with Meta—and that unexpected equity kicker—has investors still puzzling over the implications.
- Attention turns to U.S. inflation numbers on Friday, with Broadcom’s earnings next week also on the radar for clues about AI investment.
Shares of Advanced Micro Devices dropped 3.4% to close at $203.68 on Thursday, hit by a broader pullback in chip stocks after Nvidia reported earnings.
The drop grabbed attention—semis have been moving in lockstep lately, with Nvidia largely steering sentiment for the sector. “It feels like an Nvidia hangover that’s specific to the AI space,” said Michael Green, chief strategist at Simplify Asset Management, after the Philadelphia semiconductor index broke its 11-week win streak. Reuters
AMD shares are still feeling the lift from its newly inked five-year supply agreement with Meta Platforms, a deal that could bring in as much as $60 billion and features a performance-based warrant—Meta might end up owning up to 10% of the chipmaker. “Meta is locking in supply, diversifying away from a single vendor,” Hargreaves Lansdown senior equity analyst Matt Britzman said. Over at AJ Bell, Dan Coatsworth flagged that the “return of circular transactions” should keep investors alert. Reuters
AMD and Meta are pitching their deal as a move to expand “inference” capabilities—the phase when trained AI models actually respond to users—using data center infrastructure on the gigawatt scale. “We’re excited to form a long-term partnership with AMD to deploy efficient inference compute,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said. AMD’s CFO Jean Hu, for her part, pointed to the deal’s upside, saying the company expects “substantial multi-year revenue growth” as a result. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Think of a warrant as a kind of option—it lets the holder buy stock later for a predetermined price. In its filing, AMD disclosed that Meta’s warrant could cover as many as 160 million shares, all at just $0.01 a share. Vesting depends on hitting certain purchase milestones plus stock price targets, which climb as high as $600 for the later batches. The warrant runs out on Feb. 23, 2031.
Traders weren’t just reacting to AMD on Thursday—it was a gut check for the whole AI spending wave. Nvidia’s shares dragged chip stocks lower across the board. “The competitive picture is also shifting,” eMarketer’s Jacob Bourne pointed out, noting Meta is now pivoting to AMD, and the major cloud firms are pouring cash into their own custom silicon. Reuters, citing hyperscaler disclosures, put expected capital outlays at a hefty $630 billion in 2026—so the payoff question isn’t going away. Reuters
AMD shares have swung sharply: up 8.77% on Feb. 24, then down 1.39% a day later, before dropping 3.40% on Thursday.
The Meta deal doesn’t end the debate right away. For AMD, the stakes are obvious: hit the volumes and keep up with Nvidia’s next push, and there’s plenty of upside. Miss a step—whether it’s supply hiccups, sharper price battles, or a hiccup in AI spending—and sentiment could take over, with shares once again trading more on story than substance. And that warrant, meant to align interests, could quickly become a dilution red flag instead.
All eyes are on Friday’s U.S. producer price index for January, set for release at 8:30 a.m. ET. The reading could jolt rate expectations, especially if inflation comes in hot, and that would have a direct impact on discount rates for long-duration tech stocks.
Chip watchers looking for fresh signals on AI demand beyond the Nvidia crowd will get another data point March 4, when Broadcom drops its quarterly numbers. That report lands as investors weigh whether the “everyone needs more compute” narrative still has legs. Nasdaq
