When Citigroup (NYSE:C) tech analyst Glen Yeung upgraded Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE:AMD) to a "buy" recommendation on Monday, he made a lot of people very happy.

AMD shareholders like yours truly saw a 9% pop in the share price, and the stock has stayed on that level ever since. And plenty of industry observers found an outlet for their misgivings about the company. That includes several of my fellow Fools. I love them all dearly, but they're dead wrong this time.

Rich Smith doesn't trust Yeung's conclusion that AMD's low ratio of enterprise value to sales makes for a good risk/reward situation. By and large, AMD's peers are profitable, says Rich. "IBM (NYSE:IBM), Intel (NASDAQ:INTC), Sigma Designs (NASDAQ:SIGM) -- they don't just sell stuff at a loss; they earn profits on their sales -- a trick that AMD has yet to master."

Eric Jhonsa weighed in with another downbeat opinion, enumerating the ways in which AMD's chips couldn't measure up with the performance of Intel's products. And Brian Pacampara simply used AMD as an example of unpredictable one-day poppers with the obvious implication that the company didn't deserve a star turn.

So here's my take on the AMD situation: You would have to keep your investment horizon on a very short leash in order to call AMD anything but a screaming buy at these prices. Glen Yeung doesn't even factor into my position -- AMD speaks for itself.

Sure, Intel is winning the raw performance war at the moment in most segments. But AMD wins on power efficiency in many cases, and in performance-per-dollar all over the place. Consumers and IT directors think about these things when they make purchase decisions, Eric -- it's not all about having more horses under the hood.

Rich, the new AMD with a manufacturing division powered by Arabian cash is a lean, mean machine. The company is not far from its stated breakeven point -- $1.3 billion of quarterly sales. And with old inventories all cleared out, margins will improve. Do you really want to sit on the sidelines when AMD shocks the market with an actual profit report? I sure don't.

The semiconductor industry can be brutal, and right now AMD is suffering from a couple of years of sub-par performance. Until the earnings actually happen, investors everywhere will remain far too skeptical to take advantage of an unnaturally depressed valuation.

Some call AMD a speculative stock. I don't. The worst that can happen to this underdog is that someone like IBM or Texas Instruments (NYSE:TXN) buys it for a nice little buyout premium. Intel can't afford to kill its smaller competitor with truly murderous pricing and promotions, or regulators would be on its back like corned beef on rye, or the European Union on Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT).

Step off, guys. AMD is both safe and exciting. I'm expecting the comments box below to fill up with a chorus of investors taking my view. As always, Foolish debate from detractors is welcomed as well.