Intel’s stock took a nosedive on Thursday morning, August 7, 2025, as political firestorms and financial woes collided in a perfect storm for the tech titan.
According to the Daily Mail, the chipmaker’s shares fell 3.1% mid-morning in New York, sparked by a scathing Truth Social post from Donald Trump, who demanded the resignation of Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan over alleged conflicts of interest, alongside accusations from Senator Tom Cotton about Tan’s ties to Chinese entities.
Let’s rewind to the start of this saga. Lip-Bu Tan assumed the CEO role at Intel in March 2025, inheriting a company already facing fierce competition and declining demand.
By April 2025, Intel sounded the alarm on job cuts, citing mounting pressures in the tech sector. The company, once a Silicon Valley juggernaut known for powering millions of Dell, HP, and Lenovo computers, missed the smartphone revolution and has struggled to catch the AI chip wave.
In July 2025, Intel confirmed massive layoffs while reporting a staggering $2.9 billion loss over the prior three months to Wall Street. This wasn’t a one-off—Intel slashed its workforce by 15% in 2024, ousted its previous CEO in December of that year, and now plans to cut 25,000 jobs in 2025, shrinking from 99,500 to 75,000 employees.
Operationally, Intel is retrenching hard. It’s abandoning factory projects in Germany and Poland, slowing construction in Ohio, and consolidating operations from Costa Rica into larger hubs in Vietnam and Malaysia.
The political bombshell dropped on August 7, 2025, when Donald Trump took to Truth Social with a blunt message. "The CEO of Intel is highly CONFLICTED and must resign, immediately," Trump posted, stirring instant market reaction. He didn’t stop there, adding, "There is no other solution to this problem." This public call-out sent shockwaves through investors already jittery about Intel’s future.
Senator Tom Cotton piled on with a letter to Intel Chairman Frank Yeary, accusing Tan of financial links to Chinese chip firms tied to the Chinese Communist Party and the People’s Liberation Army. Cotton pointed to Tan’s past role at Cadence Design Systems, which admitted in July 2025 to violating U.S. export controls by selling tech to a Chinese military-affiliated university.
The allegations against Tan are serious and detailed. Cotton claims Tan controls numerous Chinese companies and holds stakes in hundreds of advanced-manufacturing and chip firms, with at least eight allegedly connected to the People’s Liberation Army.
For a company like Intel, historically a bedrock of American tech dominance since its microprocessor heyday in the 1990s, these accusations strike at the heart of national security concerns. Investors, already wary of Intel’s financial bleed, now face geopolitical risks clouding the horizon.
What does this mean for the free market? Government scrutiny, while sometimes necessary, can distort corporate decision-making and spook shareholders, as seen in today’s 3.1% stock drop. Yet, if Tan’s ties are as deep as alleged, the risks of foreign influence in critical tech infrastructure can’t be ignored.
For wealth-builders and liberty-minded investors, Intel’s plight is a cautionary tale of innovation lag and geopolitical entanglement. The company’s second major workforce reduction in two years—15,000 jobs already gone in 2025, with 10,000 more to come—signals deep structural challenges.
So, what’s the play here? If you’re holding Intel stock, consider the dual headwinds of operational losses and political scrutiny—diversifying into competitors who’ve seized the AI chip market might be prudent. For the long game, keep an eye on how Intel addresses these allegations and whether it can pivot to growth sectors without government overreach stifling recovery.
Intel’s story isn’t just about one CEO or one stock drop—it’s a microcosm of how global politics, market forces, and innovation races collide. Stay informed, stay skeptical of unchecked power, and above all, stay invested in companies that prioritize efficiency over entanglement.