• Northland downgraded AMD stock to ‘Market Perform.’
• Earlier this week, DA Davidson upgraded the stock to ‘Buy’ and hiked the price target by 70%.
• AMD reports Q1 results on May 5 after the closing bell; the consensus estimates for revenue are $9.88 billion, and EPS is $1.28.

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) shares caught investor attention on Monday after Northland Capital Markets downgraded the stock to ‘Market Perform’ from ‘Outperform’ ahead of earnings next week.

The firm set a price target of $260, implying a potential downside of more than 25% from Friday’s close. Shares of the company traded nearly 3% lower on Monday morning and are on track to snap its four-day winning streak. The stock has closed in the red only once so far this month.

AMD reports first-quarter (Q1) results on May 5, after the closing bell. The consensus estimate for revenue is $9.88 billion, and EPS is $1.28.

Analyst Rationale

According to TheFly, Northland said Intel (INTC) is catching up to AMD. This commentary follows rival chipmaker’s Q1 results, which blew past Wall Street expectations. 

The firm also pointed out that competition from NVIDIA (NVDA), through its partnership with Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) in AI infrastructure and PCs, will limit AMD's gross margin expansion and keep its R&D spending elevated.

Although Northland believes AMD is a “phenomenal company,” the firm said its calendar year 2027 consensus is "likely too high," per TheFly.

For 2027, Fiscal AI polled estimates for earnings at $11.01 per share on revenue of $68.11 billion. The 2027 estimates for EPS are 64% higher, and for revenue, they are nearly 46% higher than the 2026 consensus.

On the broader AI infrastructure spending, Northland expects the trend to decline in 2027, citing hyperscaler capex constraints and belt-tightening by AI companies.

DA Davidson’s Take

Last week, DA Davidson upgraded AMD to ‘Buy’ from ‘Neutral,’ saying the magnitude of Intel’s earnings beat was actually the reason for its bullish outlook.

They said Intel’s performance shows that CPUs are “reinserting” themselves as an indispensable foundation of the AI era, and AMD, being a key rival, could also benefit from this demand.

“We view Intel's results as a precursor for a huge step-up for AMD's CPU franchise and believe the structural shift towards agentic AI workloads is creating unprecedented demand for server CPUs," DA Davidson analyst Gil Luria said Friday.

The firm hiked its price target by 70% to $375, implying nearly 8% upside as of Friday’s close.

How Did Retail Traders React?

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment about AMD remained ‘extremely bullish’ amid ‘extremely high’ messaging volumes over the last 24 hours.

One user on the platform thinks the stock will go down to $300 before climbing to $400.

Another user thinks the AMD downgrade “confirms rally higher will continue.”

AMD stock has risen more than 54% so far this year and more than tripled in value over the last 12 months, outperforming the benchmark S&P 500 index, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH), and the iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX).

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