Interim chief named as second affair comes to light
Jensen Huang is stepping down as CEO of Nvidia, the world's largest company by market capitalization.
Colette Kress, Chief Financial Officer at Nvidia, has been named interim CEO.
The decision comes after Huang admitted to multiple affairs, including with businesswoman Alice Huang, who is alleged to be a Chinese intelligence agent. A second affair with an Nvidia employee came to light after market close on Wednesday, with Nvidia shares falling overnight outside of trading hours. Huang has apologized publicly for his infidelity.
Following the news of his resignation, Nvidia shares were down more than 13 per cent at market open, but recovered slightly in the early minutes of trading to a daily loss of roughly 7.7 per cent.
In the wake of the news about Huang's alleged 'honeypot' affair, Nvidia's board met to consider the removal of Jensen Huang as CEO of the US$4 trillion chipmaker.
Huang had been one of the faces of the AI boom. Nvidia's semiconductors play a key role in the AI data center buildout and the company has seen its revenues and share price skyrocket in recent years. Nvidia lacked a clear successor to Huang, who many investors and stakeholders had seen as personally tied to the success of his company. Shares of rival chipmaker AMD were up around two per cent in premarket trading as investors sought exposure to Nvidia's competitors.
US President Trump, who has cultivated a close relationship with Huang and approved Nvidia chip shipments to China over security objections, defended the CEO earlier this week, describing him as an "amazing guy" and an "honorable man." Trump said Huang had told him he was unaware of Alice Huang's suspected intelligence ties. Those approvals and the broader relationship between the two are now under scrutiny from lawmakers, several of whom have called for Huang's resignation and threatened subpoenas.
Huang, 63, co-founded Nvidia in 1993 and owns approximately 3.6% of the company, making him one of its largest shareholders.
This is an evolving story with more details to come.
