Nvidia Loses Half a Trillion in Value as Board Probes Jensen Huang Affair

Nvidia shed nearly half a trillion dollars in market value during Thursday's tech selloff, and the stock was down more than 5% to $176 in premarket trading again Monday — this time not on AI fears, but on a scandal unfolding inside the company's own boardroom.

On Sunday night, CEO Jensen Huang admitted he had an affair. The other party, according to reports, is a business executive named Alice Huang. The two are not related. She also goes by Huang Le, a former television reporter in China who later became an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore-based company that operates facilities housing computer systems.

Why does this matter beyond the personal drama?

U.S. officials reportedly identified Alice Huang as working for Chinese intelligence, according to The New York Times, which broke the story of the alleged intelligence effort. The national security implications reach straight into Nvidia's commercial future.

The Times reported that Megaspeed purchased more than $4.8 billion in Nvidia chips over two years. That figure alone would make the Singapore firm one of Nvidia's most significant customers. More damaging: Nvidia continued selling to Megaspeed after the newspaper disclosed a Commerce Department investigation into whether the customer was helping move restricted AI chips into China.

That detail lands at the worst possible moment. Nvidia's access to China — a potential source of future chip sales — is already a live debate in Washington. Huang has advocated allowing exports of earlier generations of advanced AI chips to China while withholding the newest technology. The disclosures now add a national security dimension to that argument, handing ammunition to those who want tighter restrictions on the company's China business.

What happens next at the top?

Nvidia has formed a committee of independent directors, assisted by outside independent counsel, to oversee an investigation. Huang will remain chief executive during the probe.

Few expect him to step down. Support is coming in from the investing world and from American political leadership, according to the report. But that support carries a condition: Huang has to prove he was duped. Serious developments — such as withholding important information from directors or misleading the board — could change the calculus quickly.

There's also a middle path. One alternative scenario would see Huang resign as CEO but transition into an executive chairman role, keeping his engineering and AI roadmap intact while retaining his grip on the company's helm.

How are investors reading it?

Nvidia pared some of Thursday's losses in the subsequent session before renewed selling pressure returned Monday morning. The stock is nearing a six-month low, and the episode has sparked a fresh valuation debate between bulls and bears even before the affair became public.

The backdrop matters. The chipmaker was already wrestling with a broader AI-driven tech reckoning that wiped out massive market value across the sector last week. Now the company faces a two-front problem: external pressure on its China sales and internal questions about whether its founder-led leadership kept the board fully informed.

What does the probe hinge on?

The independent committee's work will likely center on a few questions the source material raises directly:

• Did Huang know about Alice Huang's reported intelligence ties, and when?
• Why did Nvidia keep selling to Megaspeed after the Commerce Department investigation became public through the Times' reporting?
• Was the board informed at any point before the story broke?

Until the committee answers those, Huang's position rests on the claim that he was deceived. For a CEO who has built Nvidia into the dominant supplier of AI accelerators, the coming weeks will test whether investors and political backers keep faith — and whether the $4.8 billion in chip sales to a single Singapore customer becomes the number that reshapes Nvidia's China strategy from the inside.