Artificial intelligence chip architect Nvidia is the first company in history valued at $4 trillion, the latest milestone achieved by the undisputed leader of the generative AI gold rush.
Nvidia has transformed from an idea at a Bay Area Denny’s to the world’s largest company.
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Key Takeaways
- Nvidia stock climbed as much as 2.8% Wednesday morning to a new all-time high of $164.42.
- The Silicon Valley giant’s market capitalization climbed to $4.01 trillion, becoming the first ever publicly traded firm to score a $4 trillion valuation.
- Nvidia outranks the perhaps more household name tech giants Microsoft ($3.7 trillion market cap), Apple ($3.1 trillion), Amazon ($2.4 trillion) and Google parent Alphabet ($2.2 trillion) on the list of the world’s five largest companies.
Big Number
Nearly 35,000%. That’s how much Nvidia’s share price has risen over the last decade, trouncing the S&P 500’s roughly 260% advance, including reinvested dividends. That means a $1,000 investment in Nvidia in July 2015 would now be worth $350,000.
Surprising Fact
Nvidia is worth more than the United Kingdom’s $3.9 trillion gross domestic product last year.
Key Background
Worth just more than $10 billion a decade ago, Nvidia’s rise has been nothing short of meteoric, first eclipsing a $1 trillion valuation in 2023 and crossing the $2 trillion and $3 trillion marks in 2024. Wall Street’s infatuation with the firm based in Santa Clara, California closely followed the rise of generative AI services such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot, as Nvidia holds a dominant share in designing the hardware and software stack needed to power the pricey programs. Nvidia’s core products are its graphics processing units (GPUs), the gold standard to train advanced AI programs. Among Nvidia’s big-ticket customers are OpenAI, Elon Musk’s Tesla and xAI, Meta and Amazon.
Tangent
The $4 trillion Nvidia has a humble origin story, tracing back to a 1993 meeting at a booth of a Denny’s diner between cofounders Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky, and Curtis Priem.
Forbes Valuation
Huang, whose first job was a busboy at Denny’s, is now the world’s ninth-richest person with a $142 billion net worth, according to our latest calculations. Nearly all of his fortune stems from his 3.5% stake in Nvidia.
