US stocks AI new opportunity: "Old Seven Heroes" outperforms "Seven Giants"?

Micron, Texas Instruments, Cisco, Intel, Dell, Nokia, Lenovo... The above names that are familiar to everyone were once shining stars in the Internet bubble era at the turn of the century. Later, in the wave of the burst of the bubble and the rise of a new generation of tech elites, they gradually faded out of the center stage. However, today, thanks to the enthusiastic and unabated wave of capital expenditure on artificial intelligence (AI), these old-school tech companies are making a strong comeback in the form of the "Avengers". In fact, throughout May, the momentum of these "old seven tech giants" has even clearly surpassed that of the "seven giants" of the US stocks represented by Nvidia and Apple... The frenzy for building AI infrastructure has led to a surge in demand in all areas, from computer servers, storage components, network equipment to even traditional chips. This has sparked a frenzy rally in stocks globally associated with these areas. The latest surge has even stirred up memories for some Wall Street veteran traders of long-dormant investment portfolios: such as the "Four Horsemen" - yes, this combination has rarely been mentioned in recent years, as in the eyes of many, only Microsoft in the "Four Horsemen" seems to keep up with the trend of tech development. However, in recent times, the "Three Horsemen" of the "Four Horsemen" - Cisco, Intel, Dell, have seen their stock performance surpass Microsoft by a significant margin... In addition to these "Three Horsemen", this year's high-flyers from the Internet era include Micron Technology, Texas Instruments, Nokia, and Lenovo. In total, these seven stocks have surged on average by 158% in 2026, with a total market capitalization increase of $1.7 trillion. "About six months ago, we began to realize that the scope of infrastructure construction for artificial intelligence was expanding significantly, and supply was severely inadequate, especially in those 'boring' hardware areas - the capacity expansion in these areas has been very limited in the past few years," said Yan Taw Boon, portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman. "And now demand is surging - from 'boring' CPUs to network equipment, passive components, storage and memory, without exception." From clunky mobile phone manufacturers to reshaping computer manufacturers, here are the latest cases of "old age regaining youth" in the US stock market: Micron Last week, Micron officially entered the trillion-dollar market cap club, nearly 50 years after it was founded in the basement of a dental clinic in Boise, Idaho. This memory chip manufacturer saw its stock price skyrocket in the late 1990s after acquiring Texas Instruments' memory business, becoming one of the world's largest memory manufacturers. From its peak in July 2000 to its trough in November 2008, its market cap evaporated by over 98%. It wasn't until early 2022 that its stock price hit a new all-time high. However, in the past year, the stock has become a representative beneficiary in the downstream of the AI spending boom. As one of the leading manufacturers of High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) chips, the company's chip demand has surged far beyond supply capacity. Its stock has soared over 903% in the past 12 months and set the fastest record of its market cap jumping from $500 billion to $1 trillion in just 48 trading days. Texas Instruments Headquartered in Dallas, Texas, Texas Instruments was once the absolute dominator in the analog chip field in the 1990s. Its chips that convert real-world signals into digital signals (0 and 1) were the core lifelines of telecommunications equipment and mobile phones at that time. However, with the slowdown in telecom network construction and declining demand, its stock price fell by over 85% from peak to trough between 2000 and 2002. At the beginning of the AI era led by ChatGPT, Texas Instruments had a weak start due to fluctuations in customer demand in the automotive and industrial markets. However, as demand increased for chips for higher power density AI servers, its sales accelerated. Currently, Texas Instruments' data center business has annual sales of over $1 billion, with business revenue growing by over 60% in 2025. Market data shows that Texas Instruments' stock price has already surged 76% this year, potentially achieving its best annual performance since 2003. Intel Just less than two years ago, due to various constraints in its manufacturing process, Intel's former dominant position in semiconductors seemed to have become a thing of the past, and was even judged by investors as being "completely out". However, the path of redemption to the peak for the company is nothing short of a grand spectacle. In the past decade, the company has changed CEOs four times like a revolving door. Current CEO Pat Gelsinger was hailed by Wall Street when he took office last year, despite months later facing a political storm demanding his resignation by former President Trump, he quickly turned the situation around and ultimately succeeded in bringing in strategic investments from the US government. Subsequently, Nvidia followed with a $5 billion investment. In March of this year, when Intel announced that its new Xeon chips were being used in some Nvidia systems, its stock price soared again. Last month, after Intel released sales forecasts that far exceeded Wall Street's expectations, its stock hit a new high. Earlier this month, it was reported that Intel had reached a preliminary agreement with Apple to produce some chips for its devices, a move seen as the fruition of Intel's foundry business. Since the beginning of this year, Intel's stock price has risen by 211%, expected to achieve its best performance ever. Dell Last Friday, Dell's stock price soared 33%, marking the largest single-day gain in history. Prior to this, the hardware manufacturer known for its personal computer business reported a surge in demand for its AI servers. This surge in stock price may evoke memories of Dell's heyday - in the late 1990s, its stock price rose over 200% for three consecutive years. However, after the burst of the Internet bubble caused the company's market cap to evaporate by over 80%, Dell was privatized in 2013. Dell returned to the public market at the end of 2018, and its current market cap is $125 billion higher than its peak of $148 billion in March 2000. Emmanuel Valavanis of Forte Securities said, the latest stunning financial report proves that Dell is "the latest tech 'dinosaur' to be reborn as an AI giant." Lenovo LENOVO GROUP's international fame came when it shockingly acquired IBM's PC business in 2005. This acquisition gave it the rights to the iconic commercial notebook series ThinkPad and laid the foundation for it to eventually become the world's largest PC manufacturer. While the personal computer industry has been in a long-term decline for many years, Lenovo's push for AI products and services helped the Chinese computer hardware company achieve a 20% revenue growth in the past year, with nearly 40% of its total sales coming from these businesses. Lenovo's US ADR surged 105% throughout May, reaching a historic high, its best monthly performance in over 25 years. At the same time, the stock also ranks first among constituents of the Hang Seng Index with a 159% year-to-date increase - more than three times the return rate of the second-ranked constituent stock. Nokia Nokia suffered setbacks in the 2000s: first, the boom in the telecommunications industry turned into a downturn, followed by a blow to its mobile phone business from the rise of smartphones. From its peak market value of 300 billion euros, the stock plummeted by 98% by 2012. After selling its mobile business to Microsoft in 2014, Nokia went through a difficult rebirth focusing on less eye-catching telecommunication network equipment. And the company's latest comprehensive recovery is largely due to the precise acquisition of the US optical communications company Infinera in 2025 - a time when explosive growth in demand for high-speed connections between clusters of computing power in AI data centers occurred. Market data shows that Nokia's stock price has surged over 124% this year, making it the fourth best-performing stock in the STOXX Europe 600 Index. However, the stock has not yet returned to its high point during the Internet bubble era, still falling nearly 80% below its historical closing high. Cisco Systems If there is one company that epitomizes the "Renaissance" of old-school tech stocks in this round, it may be Cisco. As the undisputed king of network equipment, Cisco was the absolute facade of the Internet bubble era and briefly topped the global market cap throne in 2000. Currently, the company has transformed from traditional networking business to a provider of artificial intelligence infrastructure, and its latest quarterly financial report released earlier this month shows success in the AI era - in addition to strong revenue expectations for the fourth quarter, the report also announced a plan to lay off employees to focus on AI transformation. This financial data is the latest testimony to the company's return to the upward trend and further continues the strong momentum established last year due to the turning point in demand related to AI. Driven by this force, the stock has finally returned to its historical peak this year, breaking through its peak in March 2000. Market data shows that as of 2026, Cisco's stock price has gained 56%, and is expected to achieve the largest year-to-date lead over the NASDAQ 100 Index since 2006. (Source: Finance Association, GMT8) Editor: Chen Wenfang.