Weekly market brief
Nvidia without Jensen Huang: the scandal, the history and what comes next
Nvidia's CEO resigned after a week of scandal and the stock fell about a third from its high. Here is what happened, how strong the business really is, and how we approach it.
Coach Toni · · 3 min read
This week in 60 seconds
- The story: Jensen Huang resigned as Nvidia's CEO on November 12 after a week of scandal. CFO Colette Kress is interim CEO.
- The damage: NVDA closed at $162.85 on Friday, about 32% below its October high. Around $1.7 trillion in value is gone.
- The business: still growing fast. Revenue more than doubled in a year, and results land on Tuesday, November 17.
- The wider market: stocks still rose about 2% for the week, but inflation is sticky, bond yields are above 5% and a Fed hike in December looks likely.
- Our approach: no panic and no chasing. A great company is not always a great buy. Price decides.
The week in numbers
| What | Where it stands (Nov 13) |
|---|---|
| S&P 500 | 7,561.67, up about 2.5% for the week |
| Nasdaq | 25,136.27, up about 2% for the week |
| NVDA | $162.85, down about 12% for the week |
| Nvidia's value | Below $4 trillion, from about $5.7 trillion in October |
| US 10-year bond yield | 5.15% to 5.17%, the highest since October |
| Fed in December | A rate hike is expected on Dec 8–9 |
| Bitcoin | Below $70,000 for the first time in nearly three months |
What happened at Nvidia
This was the biggest leadership crisis in Nvidia's 33-year history.
Some of it is confirmed. Much of it is still only reported. We keep the two apart.
| Date | What happened | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 29 | The New York Times reports a close relationship between Huang and Alice Huang, an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore Nvidia customer under investigation for possible chip export violations | Reported |
| Nov 5 | Three House committee chairs ask Huang for a closed-door briefing on his ties to Chinese intelligence | Confirmed |
| Nov 8 | Huang tells staff he was unfaithful to his wife. The board opens an independent investigation | Confirmed |
| Nov 9 | Shares fall more than 5% | Confirmed |
| Nov 9–10 | Reports that companies linked to Alice Huang's family bought about $7.5 billion of Nvidia chips, including banned ones | Reported |
| Nov 11 | Reports of further affairs with Nvidia employees. Shares fall about 8% after hours | Reported |
| Nov 12 | Huang resigns as CEO and from the board. Colette Kress becomes interim CEO and Harvey C. Jones becomes board chair | Confirmed |
| Before Nov 26 | Huang has agreed to testify to Congress behind closed doors | Confirmed |
Nvidia's board says it has no reason to believe national security or company secrets were compromised. US officials have not publicly confirmed the espionage claims.
For investors, the personal story matters less than one question: can Nvidia keep winning without the man who built it?
What the market did
NVDA had its worst week since the tariff sell-off and its longest run of weekly losses since 2012. It closed below $4 trillion in value for the first time since July 2025.
Rival chipmakers AMD and AVGO (Broadcom) jumped early in the week. Investors saw them as the alternatives big customers might turn to.
By Friday the whole chip sector was falling. AMD lost about 9%, Broadcom about 6% and Micron about 5% that day.
How Nvidia got here
From graphics cards to the engine of AI
| Year | Milestone |
|---|---|
| 1993 | Founded by Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky and Curtis Priem, famously planned over meetings at a Denny's diner |
| 1999 | Goes public and launches the GeForce 256, the chip that made "GPU" a household term for gamers |
| 2006 | Launches CUDA, letting scientists use graphics chips for general computing. Few cared at the time |
| 2012 | Researchers train a breakthrough AI image model on Nvidia chips. CUDA becomes the default tool for AI |
| 2022 | ChatGPT launches, trained on thousands of Nvidia GPUs. Demand explodes |
| 2023 | Nvidia passes $1 trillion in value |
| 2025 | First company ever to pass $4 trillion, then $5 trillion |
| Oct 2026 | Record high, worth about $5.7 trillion |
Its real advantage is not only the chips. It is CUDA: millions of developers and almost every AI tool are built on it. That is hard to replace.
Nvidia has crashed before
This is not the first time Nvidia has fallen hard. Every big fall so far was followed, eventually, by new highs. That is not a guarantee for the future.
Source: Historical share prices; 2026 from Yahoo Finance
Owning Nvidia has always meant living through 50% drops. The people who made money bought during them, not at the top.
Where Nvidia stands today
The business is far stronger than the share price suggests.
| Latest quarter (to July 2026) | A year earlier | |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $96.2 billion | $46.7 billion |
| Data center (AI) revenue | $89.0 billion | |
| Gross margin | 75% | |
| Next quarter's forecast | $108 billion, assuming no AI chip sales to China |
Source: Nvidia results; forecast is Nvidia's own guidance
After the fall, Nvidia trades at roughly 11 to 13 times next year's expected profits. That is cheap for a company growing this fast. It is cheap because investors now see more risk.
The future: three scenarios
Nobody can predict this. But we can prepare for the possibilities.
| Scenario | What would need to happen | What it could mean for the stock |
|---|---|---|
| Good | Strong results on Nov 17, a respected new CEO, customers stay loyal, the next chip (Vera Rubin) ramps on time | The fall looks like a gift in hindsight |
| Middle | The business keeps growing, but leadership and legal questions drag on for months | Sideways and volatile until there is clarity |
| Bad | Big customers shift to AMD, Broadcom or their own chips, export-control probes lead to penalties, AI spending slows | Further falls, even with good current profits |
The biggest risks to watch:
- Leadership: Huang was the strategy, the salesman and the face of AI. A permanent CEO has not been named.
- Competition: Google, Amazon and Microsoft are building their own AI chips, many designed with Broadcom.
- Washington: export-control investigations and Congressional hearings over sales to China.
- AI spending: if the big cloud companies slow their investment, Nvidia feels it first.
What else moved markets
| Event | What happened | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Inflation (CPI) | Up 0.4% in October, core up 0.3% | Still too hot for the Fed |
| Producer prices (PPI) | Up 6.5% over the year, the highest since 2022 | Costs could feed into consumer prices |
| Bond yields | 10-year near 5.15% | Higher yields pressure stock valuations |
| The Fed | A rate hike is expected on Dec 8–9 | Fed Governor Bowman said hikes may be needed |
| Bitcoin | Below $70,000 | Risky assets are being sold first |
Despite all this, the S&P 500 still rose about 2.5% for the week. One company's crisis did not sink the market.
What to watch next
| When | What | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Tue, Nov 17 | Nvidia results | The first numbers since Huang left. Watch the forecast and customer comments |
| Before Nov 26 | Huang testifies to Congress | Could bring new facts on China chip sales |
| Coming weeks | Nvidia's CEO search | A strong, permanent CEO would calm investors |
| Dec 8–9 | Fed meeting | A hike would pressure tech stocks |
For investors in francs: most of our US investments are priced in dollars. A weaker dollar lowers your return in francs, even when US stocks rise.
The attitude to have
Great company, wrong price, bad trade.
Nvidia may well come out of this stronger. It may not. We don't need to know.
We decide in advance what we would pay, and then we wait. Patience is the strategy.
The best buying opportunities usually arrive with the worst headlines.
Sources: TechCrunch; Yahoo Finance; CNBC; Bloomberg; Forbes; The Motley Fool; Nvidia results and guidance; Investinglive; Britannica. Data as of the close on November 13, 2026. Some details of the Nvidia story are reported but not confirmed and may change. Educational content, not personal advice.
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