Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) shares jumped more than 2% in Thursday's premarket session, riding a wave of optimism in semiconductor stocks and a fresh vote of confidence from Bank of America Securities.

Analyst Vivek Arya reiterated a Buy rating on AMD and raised his price target to $560 from $500, citing stronger expectations for both CPU and GPU demand. The catalyst? Agentic AI — a new breed of artificial intelligence that can reason, plan, and execute tasks autonomously. Unlike the GPU-heavy training workloads that have dominated the AI narrative so far, agentic AI relies heavily on CPUs for latency-sensitive tasks like orchestration and decision-making.

BofA named AMD its top CPU pick, pointing to the company's established market position, product roadmap, and an upcoming AI Day event where it will launch its next-generation Venice processor. The firm estimates that agentic AI could expand the server CPU market to more than $170 billion by 2030.

The broader analyst consensus is also bullish. AMD carries a Buy rating with an average price target of $477.67. Recent upgrades include Barclays raising its target to $665 and TD Cowen to $600, both on June 1.

Technical Picture: Consolidating, But Trend Intact

AMD is trying to regain momentum after pulling back from its June highs. The stock sits about 2.7% below its 20-day simple moving average of $476.73, suggesting some near-term consolidation. But zoom out, and the trend is clearly your friend. Shares trade roughly 23.7% above the 50-day SMA, 57.8% above the 100-day SMA, and 85.2% above the 200-day SMA. The golden cross from July 2025 is still intact, and the stock has gained more than 273% over the past 12 months.

Market conditions are helping too. Nasdaq futures were up 1.33% before the bell, with the S&P 500, Russell 2000, and Dow all in the green. The iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) advanced more than 1%.

ETF Exposure: A Big Fish in Several Ponds

AMD is a heavyweight in several tech and AI-focused ETFs. It accounts for 8.03% of the iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX), 6.26% of the iShares Future AI & Tech ETF (ARTY), and 7.37% of the ARK Next Generation Internet ETF (ARKW). That kind of weighting means fund flows can move the stock — and vice versa.

Price Action

AMD shares were up 2.2% at $462.36 in premarket trading Thursday, according to market data.