New York, June 5, 2026, 19:05 (EDT)
POET Technologies Inc. shares tumbled Friday, falling as the wider semiconductor space dropped. The Nasdaq-listed chip stock was recently at $11.86, off nearly 23% from Thursday. The shares moved between $10.86 and $15.06, with trading volume at 57.1 million.
POET is turning into a volatile test for the AI-infrastructure trade. The small photonics company has made big commercial claims, brought in new capital, and now its shareholders are weighing execution risk against the upside of optical data center links.
Nasdaq ran on a normal schedule Friday, with trading open from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Eastern, according to the exchange. The next U.S. market holiday isn’t until June 19 for Juneteenth. Markets took a hit. The Nasdaq Composite slid 4.18%, the S&P 500 dropped 2.64%, and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index posted its sharpest single-day percentage loss since March 2020, Reuters said.
Ryan Detrick, chief market strategist at Carson Group, told Reuters, “the dam just broke today,” following the market’s record streak. Ohsung Kwon, chief equity strategist at Wells Fargo, called the move “not the end of the semi bull market.” Reuters
POET’s news site on Friday still showed the $400 million investment closing from May 18 as its most recent press release. No new statement from the company explained the day’s stock movement. Attention stayed on the old string of updates from May, including the Lumilens order, the financing, and previous issues with Marvell.
POET calls itself a maker of photonic integrated circuits—chips that use light instead of just electrical signals to transfer data—as well as light sources and optical modules for AI and data-center customers. The company pushes its Optical Interposer platform as a method to combine electronic and photonic devices in a single chip package.
Bullish investors got a lift on May 15 after Lumilens put in an initial $50 million order for EOI-based engines. POET said that order could mark the start of a supplier arrangement that may go past $500 million in total purchases over the next five years. “GPU interconnects are emerging as the defining bottleneck for scaling AI,” Lumilens chief executive Ankur Singla said, pointing to the links that shuffle data between graphics processors in AI gear. POET Technologies
POET closed a registered direct offering three days later, selling 19,047,620 common shares and the same number of warrants in a deal with an investor. Warrants give buyers the option to buy shares later at a set price. The company said it raised $400 million in gross proceeds and said it would use the funds for manufacturing expansion, research and development, working capital, and possible acquisitions.
POET chairman and CEO Dr. Suresh Venkatesan said the company is increasing wafer production and optical engine assembly “by roughly ten-fold” to meet higher-volume manufacturing into 2027. Venkatesan said a “strong balance sheet enhances POET’s credibility” with customers and suppliers. POET Technologies
The securities filing set the price for each common share plus warrant at $21.00. The warrants can be exercised at $26.25 and will last three years. The filing also warned that heavy share sales, or even expectations of those sales, could put pressure on the stock price.
Competitive signals are still mixed. Marvell is key to the POET story after buying Celestial AI—then later canceling Celestial’s purchase orders. Bigger chip names like Nvidia and Broadcom were also among semiconductor stocks falling in Friday’s wider decline. POET said on April 27 that Marvell dropped all Celestial AI orders, with Marvell alleging POET violated confidentiality.
The bear case is straightforward. Investors need to see if Lumilens and the rest move from purchase orders to steady production revenue. There’s also dilution, the Marvell cancellation, and tax-status issues overhang the stock. POET said it thinks it was a passive foreign investment company, or PFIC, for 2025—a U.S. tax class that can hit U.S. holders. CFO Thomas Mika said he doesn’t expect the company to be a PFIC in 2026 and said POET plans to redomicile in the U.S.
POET’s next big thing on its calendar is the virtual AGM set for June 26. That leaves traders with little to go on until then. The focus now turns to actual news — shipment updates, any progress on ramping up manufacturing, and what happens after Friday’s big semiconductor drop: was it a blip or the start of something worse for the group?
