Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speaks at Computex 2026 in Taipei, Taiwan, in June. [EPA]
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang speaks at Computex 2026 in Taipei, Taiwan, in June. [EPA]

Nvidia's share price plunged in the wake of a scandal surrounding CEO Jensen Huang, briefly stripping the chipmaker of its position as the world's second-largest company by market capitalization.

As of 12:15 p.m. Eastern time Tuesday (local time), Nvidia shares were trading at $167.35, down 6.3 percent from the previous close.

The sell-off pushed Nvidia's market cap to between $4.03 trillion and $4.05 trillion, threatening the $4 trillion threshold the company first crossed in July last year. In just two days, the fallout from the Huang scandal wiped out roughly $400 billion in market capitalization.

The share price drop also knocked Nvidia out of second place in the global market cap rankings, pushing it behind both Apple and Microsoft during trading to fall temporarily to third. It was the first time Microsoft's market cap had surpassed Nvidia's since June last year.

Bargain buying and other demand helped lift the stock to $167.75 by 1:15 p.m., however, allowing Nvidia to quickly reclaim the No. 2 spot.

Huang acknowledged Sunday that he had an extramarital affair with Alice Huang, a former executive at Megaspeed who has been identified as an agent of Chinese intelligence, and issued an apology.

Dan Ives, a technology stock analyst and partner at Yorkville Ives, said the CEO's scandal would act as "a negative overhang" on the share price.


yckim6452@heraldcorp.com