Jensen Huang Is Out. Nvidia Fell Below $150. Now What?
Jensen Huang has officially resigned as Nvidia's CEO, president, and a member of its board, effective immediately. Nvidia confirmed the departure on Thursday, November 12, ending the co-founder's 33-year run. Longtime CFO Colette Kress takes over as interim CEO and will keep her finance job while the board searches for a permanent successor. The board also named Harvey C. Jones its first-ever chair. Nvidia's announcement.
Wednesday night I figured Nvidia might open $10 to $13 lower. It traded at $149.79 in the opening minutes, nearly $24 below Wednesday's $173.73 close. Then buyers showed up. In The Guardian's live coverage of the Associated Press's 11 a.m. Eastern market update, Nvidia had pared its loss to 4.7%, while the Nasdaq Composite had recovered to a 0.1% gain. If you were waiting for a cheaper entry, you got one. You also got a firsthand look at how quickly the price can move while you're deciding.
Trump floats Tim Cook. Bettors favor Ian Buck.
President Trump publicly urged Nvidia to hire Tim Cook, who became Apple's executive chairman in September. Reuters reported that Apple and Cook didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. Nvidia says it will consider internal and external candidates, and its announcement names only Kress for the interim job. So far, the sourcing for Cook is Trump's endorsement.
The viral claim that Madison Huang is the leading candidate rests on a cropped Polymarket screenshot. I couldn't verify when it was taken. When I checked the actual market on Thursday, traders had her at about 2%, behind Nvidia engineering executive Ian Buck at 33% and Kress at about 23%. Madison leads product and technical marketing for Nvidia's physical AI platforms. Her place on a betting board tells us what traders are willing to wager. Nvidia's directors have yet to disclose a shortlist. Polymarket.
Washington still wants answers
Nvidia opened an independent inquiry on Sunday, November 8 into reports that Huang had been targeted by foreign intelligence. He acknowledged being unfaithful, and The New York Times later reported a second alleged affair involving a Nvidia executive who reported directly to him. Nvidia's resignation announcement gave no findings from the inquiry. House lawmakers had requested a November 18 briefing with Huang, and Speaker Mike Johnson said on Thursday, November 12 that Congress was moving toward agreement on tighter chip export limits. Reuters also reported that some Chinese AI firms are trying to reserve Nvidia-powered computing capacity overseas in case Washington restricts remote access. Nvidia.
Does the buy-the-dip case still hold?
Nvidia's last forecast called for $108 billion in quarterly revenue and assumed zero data-center compute revenue from China. That's why the business still deserves a look after the selloff. The harder question is what happens to customer orders, financing commitments, and the product roadmap under new leadership. In AP's morning snapshot, Nvidia-backed cloud provider CoreWeave was down 6.4% while rival chipmakers AMD and Broadcom were both up more than 5%. Investors were already making different bets on who could gain from the shake-up. Nvidia investor relations.
Nvidia reports Tuesday, November 17, after the close, with its call at 5 p.m. Eastern. The quarter ended October 25, so even a blowout tells us how the business was doing before Huang left. The number I want to hear is Kress's forecast for the next quarter. That's what will tell us whether the stock got cheaper faster than the business changed. Nvidia.
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Rich Washburn is a technologist, strategist, and Founder & Chief AI Architect of ARIA AI Labs, working at the intersection of AI, infrastructure, communications, and capital. He also serves as Managing Partner and Chief AI Officer at Eliakim Capital.
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