Nvidia Down 30% in a Month as Washington Asks Who Got Its Chips

Nvidia stock has fallen 30% in a month, trading at $160.26, after CEO Jensen Huang stepped down on November 12 amid scrutiny of his ties to an executive linked to Megaspeed, a Singapore company that rents out Nvidia chips. The decline includes a 4% drop from the prior session's close. What started as a leadership shock has now become a Washington question about who ends up with Nvidia's silicon — and whether the company checked.

CFO Colette Kress has taken interim leadership while keeping her finance role, Bloomberg reported. Nvidia's independent directors had already hired former Acting U.S. Attorney Jun H. Kim to probe whether Huang was targeted by foreign intelligence. That review, and a string of scheduled testimony, will shape the company's next chapter.

What did Treasury Secretary Bessent actually say?

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC on November 13 that the real story is: "Did Nvidia know their client, and was there a robust effort at Nvidia to make sure that there was no leakage." His question lands directly on the gap between what Nvidia has disclosed and what it hasn't.

Bessent said decisions on Megaspeed's access to Nvidia hardware rest with the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security. He also repeated that China shouldn't receive any Nvidia chips above H100s.

Nvidia's clearest public answer on China shipments came earlier. On its August 26 earnings call, Kress said: "In Q2, we shipped less than 1% of our total data center revenue in Hopper 200 products to customers based in China in accordance with U.S. government licenses." She added that the company's forward outlook carries no China data center compute revenue.

That disclosure hasn't closed the issue. Reuters has identified more than $3 billion in Chinese computing projects built around restricted Nvidia processors. On the same August call, Kress stated: "This compute we ship will be consumed by investment-grade customers or those that are backed by one." The call did not explain how Nvidia checks the ultimate users of its customers' systems — precisely the gap Bessent's comments now target.

How much was Jensen Huang worth to Nvidia?

Dan Ives of Yorkville Ives put a hard number on the leadership question. He told Bloomberg TV that Huang was worth $1 trillion to Nvidia's valuation.

In per-share terms, Ives framed it this way: "The valuation without Jensen is $225 per share. With him, it's $300." At the stock's current $160.26, the market is pricing in something worse than either scenario.

Ives said Nvidia remains two to three years ahead of China and its U.S. competitors. Still, he acknowledged that Huang's departure "clearly evens the playing field." Yorkville Ives kept its Outperform rating on the chipmaker.

Does Nvidia's financing model survive this?

Ed Yardeni addressed the other worry in a research note: Huang's exit raises concerns about Nvidia's role in financing AI infrastructure. His conclusion stayed constructive. "Our base case is that NVIDIA's financing strategy remains intact," Yardeni wrote. He added that he'd treat any resulting selloff as "another buying opportunity for the AI trade."

That strategy sets Nvidia apart from a conventional chip seller. On the August 26 call, Kress said the company would help frontier AI labs access infrastructure funded by long-term institutional capital, while insisting: "We're not making loans." She described a model in which "we get paid twice: once on the hardware sale and again through the share of rental revenue, a highly recurring stream layered on top of a one-time equipment purchase."

Whether that recurring-revenue machine keeps running depends partly on Washington's verdict, and partly on the balance sheet that supports it.

What do the bulls and bears point to?

The bears focus on Nvidia's commitments. The company carries guarantee obligations capped at $108.5 billion for AI cloud and data center partners. Its days sales outstanding also rose to 60 days from 45 days on extended payment terms.

The bulls counter with growth numbers that few companies in history have matched:

• Q2 FY2027 revenue reached $96.22 billion, up 105.8% year over year.
• Data center revenue rose 117% year over year.
• Management guided Q3 FY2027 revenue to $108 billion — and that figure excludes any China data center compute sales.

The tension between those two pictures is the real story in the stock. A company doubling revenue at near-$100-billion quarterly scale is also extending payment terms and guaranteeing partner obligations at levels that invite scrutiny if demand wobbles.

When does Washington weigh in?

The calendar is now part of Nvidia's risk profile. Huang agreed to testify in a closed-door House session before Thanksgiving. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick agreed to appear voluntarily before the Senate Banking Committee on December 10, putting Nvidia's export approvals under a second spotlight.

Nvidia isn't alone in the sector selloff. Micron (NASDAQ:MU) is down 20% over the past month to $758.04. Marvell Technology (NASDAQ:MRVL) is down 43% in that timeframe to $153.56. Still, Nvidia's decline carries outsized weight for tech-sector investors, given its role as the dominant supplier of AI training chips.

What happens next?

For Nvidia, the issue is whether the board's review and the coming testimony show a robust effort to keep restricted chips out of China. The key dates are Huang's House session, Lutnick's Senate appearance on December 10, and Nvidia's Q3 report, which the company will deliver against its $108 billion revenue outlook.

The outcomes split cleanly. Clear answers on customer screening could let Nvidia's growth record reassert itself. Fresh evidence of chip leakage could compound the decline. Until Washington's review of Nvidia's customer screening concludes, volatility in NVDA stock is the one forecast both sides share.