$3.34 trillion! Nvidia's market value tops the world

When calculated in Chinese Yuan, Nvidia's market value is approximately equivalent to 12.96 times the market value of Kweichow Moutai.

On June 18th, Eastern US time, the share price of Nvidia, the artificial intelligence chip giant, rose by 3.51% at the close of the day, with a market value reaching 3.34 trillion US dollars, surpassing Microsoft to become the company with the highest market value in the world.

According to the latest data from the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Huang Renxun's net worth has now broken through 116 billion US dollars, ranking 11th on the global billionaires list.

It is worth noting that just over a year ago, the company's market value had not yet reached the threshold of 1 trillion US dollars, ranking behind technology giants such as Google's parent company Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft.

However, on June 13, 2023, Nvidia's market value crossed the important milestone of 1 trillion US dollars; on February 23, 2024, the company's market value broke through the 2 trillion US dollar mark, setting the fastest record for market value growth from 1 trillion to 2 trillion US dollars.

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On June 5, 2024, Nvidia's market value made another leap, breaking through the 3 trillion US dollar mark, with the transition from 2 trillion to 3 trillion US dollars taking less than four months.

Subsequently, on June 6th, Nvidia's market value surpassed Apple, becoming the second-largest technology giant in the world by market value. Apple then announced at the following Global Developers Conference that it was entering the field of artificial intelligence and other major news, which propelled a significant increase in Apple's share price on June 12th, with its market value temporarily surpassing Microsoft and briefly regaining the throne of the world's most valuable company.It should be noted that Nvidia's stock price has risen by 239% last year, which means that its strong upward momentum has been sustained for at least a year and a half, and it may continue to extend. Data shows that Nvidia occupies about 80% of the data center AI chip market share, and companies such as OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google are still scrambling to buy its products.

At present, there are three companies in the United States with a market value of over 3 trillion US dollars, namely Nvidia, Microsoft, and Apple. The total market value of the above three companies is close to 10 trillion US dollars. Dan Ives, a well-known "US technology stock cheerleader" and Managing Director of Equity Research at Wedbush Securities, publicly stated on Tuesday that the bull market for US technology stocks is "just beginning". In the next year, investors will frequently talk about super technology giants with a market value of 3-4 trillion US dollars. Among them, the leading few will challenge the "4 trillion US dollar" mark in the next year, and the second echelon also has ample room for growth.

According to data from the broker Strategas, after Microsoft, Apple, and Nvidia's market value broke through 3 trillion, the three companies accounted for more than 20% of the S&P 500 index. The three giants in the US stock market already account for more than 10% of the global stock market value, which is also unprecedented in history.

Nvidia's astonishing counterattack: from a newcomer on the NASDAQ to the king of market value.

Looking back at 1999, Steve Jobs had just taken over Apple again. The little-known chip manufacturer Nvidia made its debut on the NASDAQ stock exchange.

Nvidia only took less than three years to replace the notorious oil trading group Enron and become a constituent of the S&P 500 index.

Even so, few people dared to bet that the company would become the best-performing stock in the past 25 years. Since its initial public offering (IPO), the total return of Nvidia's stock, including reinvested dividends, is 591,078%. This is a shocking number, which to some extent proves that the financial frenzy around artificial intelligence is brewing, and investors regard Nvidia as the biggest winner of the artificial intelligence boom.

However, Nvidia's rise has not been smooth sailing.

From the listing to being included in the S&P 500 index, the company's stock price rose by more than 1600%, and its market value reached about 8 billion US dollars. At the same time, the internet bubble reached its peak in March 2000, and many other technology stocks plummeted after the bubble burst.NVIDIA faced tough times in the following six years. In 2008, the financial crisis weakened demand, and the long-troubled competitor AMD began to turn things around, causing NVIDIA's stock price to plummet.

At the same time, the agreement between NVIDIA and Intel that allowed the two companies to use each other's features fell through, forcing NVIDIA to exit one of its largest markets. The two companies reached a settlement in 2011, with Intel agreeing to pay NVIDIA $1.5 billion.

The following year, NVIDIA launched graphics chips for data center servers. They can help with complex computing tasks such as oil and gas exploration and weather forecasting, allowing NVIDIA to establish a foothold in this lucrative market. However, these chips did not sell well immediately. It took NVIDIA's stock price nearly nine years to exceed the high point of 2007.

In 2015, NVIDIA's stock price soared again. During this period, the company's chips were becoming the foundation for emerging technologies, including autonomous driving and artificial intelligence.

Even after the demand from cryptocurrency miners dried up, data center sales continued to grow. From fiscal year 2017 to fiscal year 2021, NVIDIA's data center revenue increased eightfold.

In 2022, NVIDIA's stock price plummeted along with other technology stocks, which flourished during the COVID-19 pandemic era but fell into trouble due to rising interest rates and declining demand.

OpenAI released ChatGPT at the end of 2022, which immediately caused a sensation, but it took investors some time to realize that NVIDIA might benefit from it. Eventually, the surge of interest in ChatGPT and other generative AI products led to a sharp increase in orders for NVIDIA's chips.

"Their position in the industry is very solid," said Rhys Williams, Chief Strategist at Wayve Capital Management. "Obviously, they won't occupy a 95% market share forever, but it's almost impossible for someone to replace them."