Buoyed by the surge in artificial intelligence (AI), Nvidia momentarily outperformed Microsoft and Apple, claiming the title of being the planet’s most valuable corporation this past Tuesday. However, this victory was short-lived with Microsoft re-assuming the lead by Thursday. For quite some time now, the American market leadership has been a two-horse race, with Exxon Mobil being the last exception to this trend in 2013.
Not as widely recognized beyond the financial sector as Microsoft and Apple, Nvidia was barely in the S&P 500’s top 60 companies a mere five years ago. The situation took a dramatic turn with the rollout of ChatGPT at the end of 2022.
Since then, shares have skyrocketed by over 1,100 per cent from October 2022, boosting Nvidia’s market value from approximately $300 billion (€354.8 billion) to an astonishing $3.34 trillion.
Nvidia’s meteoric rise is unprecedented. According to Bespoke Investment, it took Apple and Microsoft 1,044 and 945 days, respectively, to expand their market values from $2 trillion to $3 trillion. By contrast, Nvidia accomplished this feat in just 96 days. Bespoke highlights that Nvidia’s market cap has been growing at an eye-watering rate of $1.4 billion per hour since the 19th of April.
Such exceptional growth has never been seen by investors before.