Nvidia Just Became a Whole Lot More Valuable

Nvidia has caught lightning in a bottle, and boy, is it making the company filthy rich.

Investors eagerly awaiting the company's quarterly results were not disappointed after Nvidia said its sales had more than doubled and its profit was up sevenfold, propelling its valuation to record highs.

Nvidia generated $26.04 billion in Q1 revenue, up 262% year over year, while net income of $14.88 billion was a jump of 628% from the $2.04 billion the company had posted in the same quarter last year.

The company also said it was increasing its cash dividend by 150% to $0.10 per share.

"The next industrial revolution has begun," declared Nvidia founder and Chief Executive Jensen Huang. Indeed, it has.

Next quarter, Nvidia plans to generate even more in sales: $28 billion, plus or minus 2%. The kicker? The forecast was above what analysts thought the company would be able to generate: $26.66 billion.

Nvidia is basing its revenue forecast on the success of the recently announced Blackwell class of AI chips, which are due to begin shipments this quarter. The company already believes that demand will outstrip supply.

"We are poised for our next wave of growth. The Blackwell platform is in full production," Huang said.

With so much positive news, it's no wonder the company's stock has hit a record high and crossed the $1,000 a share threshold. At this point, Nvidia's stock is so influential that it helped the technology-driven Nasdaq Composite Index to reach a record high!

But that's not all; with yet another jump in the company's stock price, Nvidia is slowly inching towards a market capitalization of $3 trillion — only months after it became a $2 trillion company.

The only other company valued at above $3 trillion is Microsoft, but the Windows maker did not achieve that milestone as quickly as Nvidia is.

"This still doesn't feel like bubble territory," Derren Nathan, head of equity analysis at Hargreaves Lansdown, told Reuters.

There is so much interest in Nvidia stock that the company has decided to make it easier for investors to own a piece of the pie. In its earnings announcement, Nvidia said it would be breaking down its shares at a ratio of 10-for-1 to make stock ownership "more accessible to employees and investors."

What a great time to be Nvidia.

Sponsored Content:

Cash is king 👑

Not long ago, investors were chasing rocketship startups in hopes of a huge payday. Boy, how times have changed. Those overvalued, buzzy startups just aren't as attractive anymore. You know what's cool? Undervalued companies that earn real profit.WebStreet finds these companies, acquires them, improves them, and sells them. (And lets you invest)

• They buy overlooked businesses already earning money
• They improve operations, so they make even more money
• They bundle everything into a single, powerful fund that you can invest in. It's like micro private equity on autopilot.

Unlike a lot of startups, WebStreet is doing great.

Are you an accredited investor looking for passive income and want to invest in businesses providing real value? Join WebStreet’s Waitlist Here.

Former OpenAI Employee Spills the Beans on Sam Altman Ouster 🤯

Sam Altman concealed the existence of ChatGPT from OpenAI's board.

That's coming from former board member Helen Toner, who recently said in a podcast that Altman had a history of withholding information and lying to its members.

The Microsoft-backed startup, which kickstarted the generative AI boom in 2022, went through its share of drama after the release of ChatGPT. Apparently, the OpenAI board only found out about the chatbot's existence after it became public on X, formerly Twitter.

"After years of these kinds of things, all four of us who fired him came to the conclusion that we just couldn't believe things that Sam was telling us," Toner said.

Worryingly, Sam also apparently gave the board inaccurate information on the safety processes for AI.

All of this boiled over into the board deciding to kick Sam out, only for him to return just a few days later with Microsoft's blessing and kicking out the same people who fired him.

"We are disappointed that Miss Toner continues to revisit these issues," OpenAI board chair Bret Taylor told the host of the podcast where Toner appeared.

Meanwhile, on the safety front, OpenAI said it had formed a committee that would deliver recommendations on "critical safety and security decisions for OpenAI projects and operations."

Altman will serve on the three-member board.

For their first task, the OpenAI Safety and Security Committee will "evaluate and further develop OpenAI’s processes and safeguards over the next 90 days," the startup said in a statement.

Despite the serious allegations, neither OpenAI nor Altman seem to be going anywhere. In fact, the company continues to partner with industry heavyweights such as News Corp to train its popular chatbot while attracting the likes of PwC to resell the enterprise version of ChatGPT.

That is some serious backing.

In Other News.. 📰

• BlackRock Takes the Crown for the Largest Spot Bitcoin ETF From Grayscale — via CoinDesk
• AI models have favorite numbers because they think they’re people — via TechCrunch
• Prisoners are using VR to prepare them for life after release — via CNN
• US court to hear challenges to potential TikTok ban in September — via Reuters
• Sam Altman is starting to look a lot like Mark Zuckerberg — via Axios
• China’s $47.5 billion chip fund will likely focus on AI amid U.S. export curbs — via CNBC

And that's a wrap! Don't forget to share this newsletter with your family and friends! See y'all next week. PEACE! ☮️

— Sheharyar Khan, Editor, Business Tech @ HackerNoon

*All rankings are current as of Monday. To see how the rankings have changed, please visit HackerNoon's Tech Company Rankings page.