Qualcomm Drops 6% as Meta Muse Trade Fuels Chip Rotation Away From Mobile Semis

Qualcomm shares fell 6% on Monday September 28 as a broad semiconductor selloff hit mobile-chip names harder than CPU-oriented peers, reversing an earlier surge past $201 that had been powered by fresh AI partnership momentum. Arm Holdings fell the steepest among large-cap chip names, sinking 9% to $282, while Marvell Technology slid 5%, underperforming a market that was otherwise enthusiastic about artificial intelligence.

The sector rotation was driven by growing enthusiasm around Meta's Muse AI agent, which sparked trader bets that orchestrating AI agents would require far more server CPU capacity, lifting Intel and AMD sharply while leaving Qualcomm and Arm behind. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon supported the underlying thesis, saying publicly that CPU demand will continue to rise and noting that Qualcomm is only just entering the data center market, though his comments positioned the company as an eventual participant rather than an immediate primary beneficiary.

The selloff also followed Qualcomm's September 24 announcement of a renewed global patent license agreement with Apple, effective April 1, 2027, when the existing deal expires. Qualcomm did not disclose financial terms or the duration of the new agreement. The deal was initially read as a positive for the company's Qualcomm Technology Licensing division, whose revenues fell 3% year over year to $1.28 billion in the third quarter of fiscal 2026 and whose earnings before taxes dropped 6% to $881 million, with the EBT margin declining to 69% from 71% a year earlier. Analysts at 247wallst carried a price target above the prevailing Wall Street consensus heading into Monday's session, citing the Apple renewal as stabilizing for QTL. QCOM stock has had a volatile year, hitting a 52-week low of $121.99 in April before rallying to a high of $259.92 in late May, then retreating to roughly $142.89 in early August before recovering to near current levels around $201 to $202.