Intel: A Lesson in Market Disruption

The Illusion of Forever: What Intel's 50-Year Chart Teaches Investors

Here's a chart worth paying attention to, it tells a compelling story about long-term investing, disruption, and the danger of complacency.

The subject? Intel Corporation. For decades, it was the face of computing—powering our PCs and laptops, setting the pace for innovation in semiconductors.

What stands out about Intel’s stock chart? After accounting for dividends, the stock delivered a remarkable and steady climb for over 25 years — from the early 1970s all the way to the year 2000. It was like an unstoppable force.

Here’s the kicker: over the next 25 years — from 2000 to this day — the stock remains down nearly 50% from its 2000 peak. Despite a few attempts to recover, including post-COVID and again in 2023, it hasn’t been able to reclaim those highs.

Isn’t that striking? A company that dominated the CPU market for so long has seen its position erode so dramatically. The shift began as rivals like AMD, and chipmakers with more advanced designs like TSMC, steadily chipped away at its market share.

This brings us to an important point: the fallacy of ‘Recency Bias’. It’s easy to assume that a stock performing well for a decade or two will keep doing so. We tell ourselves, “What could possibly go wrong?”

However, the rapid pace of disruption in today’s markets means any industry and any stock can face unexpected challenges. We’ve seen this play out with giants like Asian Paints and Reliance in different phases. Many former market favourites eventually fade, slipping out of indices and public attention.

Markets naturally reward companies that manage to disrupt the status quo. Only a very small number of firms are able to maintain their dominance over multiple decades.

This remarkable chart of Intel is a clear reminder: in investing, staying agile and not falling for the illusion of perpetual success is crucial.

Today’s Daily Byte

Nifty was down for the third straight session. As we approach the end of July, the index has seen virtually no gains this month. After peaking at the end of June, it’s been a steady decline bringing us all the way back to May levels.

Reading Time : 9 Minutes

Asset Class Returns: What 10 Years of Data Reveals About Investing

A recent infographic by ET offers valuable insights by ranking the performance of various asset classes such as silver, gold, real estate, G-Secs, and different equity segments over the past decade. These rankings not only highlight return patterns but also help investors understand how market leadership rotates across asset classes over time.

Reading Time : 2 Minutes