Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang fell two spots on Forbes’ ranking of the world’s richest people within the first half-hour of trading on Monday, as the company’s shares fell on news it is investigating his affair with a business executive the U.S. concluded was a Chinese spy.
Key Facts
Huang’s net worth fell $7.4 billion to $154.7 billion within the first half-hour of trading, sending him from No. 8 to No. 10 in Forbes’ billionaire rankings.
Nvidia shares were down 5% at 11 a.m. EST on Monday after falling as much as 7% premarket on the first trading day since the company announced its investigation into Huang, who in a statement to his staff on Sunday admitted to an affair and apologized for his actions, adding he supports the investigation.
He briefly lost his status as one of the world’s top ten richest people when the stock opened down over 7%, causing him to lose $10.3 billion.
The company’s market capitalization, which stood at $4.5 trillion at Friday’s close, fell to $4.29 trillion in the first half-hour of trading—putting Nvidia further behind Apple, which it has been frequently trading the title of the world’s most valuable public company with.
Nvidia’s board in a statement on Sunday said they are deploying a committee of independent directors and outside counsel to investigate all available information, but have “no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised.”
The development comes after The New York Times reported late last month that U.S. intelligence determined Jensen Huang had a close relationship with Alice Huang, a Chinese citizen who the U.S. believed was gathering information for Beijing.
Nvidia was the only company down premarket out of the “Magnificent Seven”—a group of seven mega-cap U.S. technology stocks, composed of Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, Meta and Tesla.
Key Background
U.S. intelligence briefed President Donald Trump on its findings about Alice Huang around a year ago, The Times reported, but he did not take action. A spokesperson for Nvidia told The Times late last month that “Jensen’s interactions with Ms. Huang are not unusual or unexpected,” adding that meeting with customers is part of his job. Huang has become an ally and tech advisor to Trump, who rolled back rules the Biden administration put in place in 2022 to limit global AI chip exports. Trump defended Huang on Sunday night, calling him an “honorable guy” and saying he’d still take him on his upcoming trip to China.
What We Know About Alice Huang
Alice Huang was reportedly recruited by Beijing’s top spy agency to collect information on Jensen Huang for China’s Ministry of State Security, according to The Times, citing a memo circulated within the Trump administration. It is unclear when she first met Huang, but they were photographed together at a bar in June 2024 and she reportedly has relationships with other AI chip leaders, including those at Gigabyte, which assembles Nvidia supercomputers. She has described herself as the chief executive of Singapore-based neocloud and AI computing service provider Megaspeed, though the company removed her from the role of managing director in its paperwork after its first eight months, according to The Times. Megaspeed formed in 2023 when 7Road, a Chinese gaming and cloud computing company, spun off its overseas operation in Singapore. The company, which partners with Nvidia and supplies its technology in the Asia-Pacific region, has been the subject of U.S. investigations into China’s access to Nvidia’s chips since 2024, when a Commerce Department official found Nvidia equipment was still in boxes at a data center site in Malaysia, suggesting it could be getting shipped out.
Forbes Valuation
Huang headed into the day as the world’s eighth-richest person, with a net worth of $162.2 billion.
What to Watch for
In addition to developments around the investigation, Nvidia is scheduled to report its quarterly earnings next Tuesday after market close. The company’s second-quarter earnings showed its data center business generating $89 billion for the period, up 117% year-over-year and representing around 92% of total revenue for the quarter, which beat expectations at $96.2 billion.
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