Apple’s tariff exemption may have been helped by Intel deal
Apple may have been pushed into a deal to contract Intel for chip production, with it claimed to have persuaded President Trump into giving it an exemption from 100% semiconductor tariffs.
In August 2025, facing the prospect of semiconductor tariffs at 100%, Apple managed to secure an exemption from the massive import fees.
It appeared at the time to have been avoided thanks to a major investment in U.S. manufacturing efforts. But it may also have been an Intel deal that helped grease the wheels.
According to sources of the Wall Street Journal on Friday, the series of meetings was chiefly about the hundreds of billions of dollars in investment. Something that received a lot of Trump-based promotion at the time.
However, those talks between Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, President Trump, and current CEO Tim Cook also involved Intel. Government officials claim that Apple was urged to make use of Intel’s manufacturing facilities for some of Apple’s chips.
Curious timing
This deal happens to take place at around the same time that the U.S. government announced a $9 billion investment in Intel common stock. This gave the U.S. government a 10% stake in the chip maker.
The investment means the White House had an incentive to secure a major deal from Apple to make it a good deal.
A year later, Trump took to Truth Social to confirm there was a deal, that Apple would source Intel chips for some products. Trump also declared “I decided to help Intel” due to a need to design and build chips in the United States.
The investment and the Apple deal announcement are good news for Intel investors, as each instance saw the stock price rise. For Trump, securing Apple made the government’s investment seem like a good deal.
Especially for a president obsessed with making deals.
Questionable importance
While the investment deal is big news, it’s not really that massive in the overall landscape.
Remember that Apple has pledged hundreds of billions of dollars to improve the U.S. manufacturing landscape. Buying chips from Intel is a very small piece of that pie.
As for what chips are being made by Intel, the speculation is that Intel will be making some chips for Macs. This could be Apple Silicon, but there are so many other chips in use in Apple products that it could be ordering items that aren’t processors.
That said, one Ming-Chi Kup report from May claimed Intel had started testing the production of Apple chips, with a view to shipping them in 2027.
With the mass absorption of memory and chips by AI infrastructure being a continuing problem, Apple does have an incentive to secure capacity. With TSMC being in high demand by multiple clients, getting access to Intel fabs could help ease constraints for some semiconductor-based components.
It may be an arrangement that benefits the U.S. government and Trump’s image as the dealmaker-in-chief. But in the current climate, it may also be one that ultimately helps Apple.
