NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang gestures during the NVIDIA GTC global AI conference in San Jose, California, US on March 17, 2026.
Carlos Barria reuters
NVIDIA Shares closed at a record high on Friday for the first time since October, pushing the company’s market cap above $5 trillion, as investors flocked to the AI ​​chip trade ahead of next week’s earnings from tech hyperscalers.
The stock closed 4.3% higher at $208.27. Nvidia has surged more than 14 times since the end of 2022, driven by surging demand for artificial intelligence services and models. Nvidia’s graphics processing units are dependent on Google, Microsoft, meta And Amazon As well as model developers OpenAI and Anthropic.
The chipmaker’s better-than-expected earnings late Thursday boosted Friday’s rally. intelWhich has been largely kept out of the AI ​​market until recently. Intel shares rose 24%, their best performance since 1987.
advanced precision instrumentswhich competes with Nvidia and Intel, jumped 14%, while the mobile device chip maker Qualcomm Soared 11%.
Investors were pulling out of large-cap technology stocks as oil prices skyrocketed due to the Iran war and subsequent supply chain disruptions. But recently the broader field of technology has come back into favor, with demand for AI infrastructure showing no signs of slowing down.
The Nasdaq is now up 15% in April, on track for its best month since April 2020.
Nvidia faces increasing competition in AI. alphabetA major Nvidia customer announced new chips that will try to rival Nvidia’s offerings when they become available to cloud customers later this year.
