HEXUS.sharewatch: another week, another big jump for AMD

AMD's share price topped $40 as recently as 2006 and have been in almost non-stop decline ever since, as Intel struck back in the CPU battle and it paid way over the odds for graphics company ATI.

Anyone who bought AMD stock at that level might find some small consolation from the fact that AMD's stock has risen by a whopping 60 percent in the past month.

The main driver behind these gains seems to be a wholesale shift in analyst sentiment towards the chip underdog, with Barclays Capital last week joining Citigroup in backing the company.

Of course these good analyst vibes have to come from somewhere, and last week we got a welcome reminder that AMD is still innovating and trying to be creative about increasing its market share.

Perhaps as a consequence of all this, Intel was the only stock in the red in another positive week for shares that saw the FTSE 100 top 5,000 for the first time in almost a year. General sentiment is that this bull market isn't sustainable for much longer, but when did that ever stop it?