Nvidia’s Jensen Huang loses $10 bn in his biggest wealth wipeout

Nvidia’s Jensen Huang loses $10 bn in his biggest wealth wipeout

Nvidia Corp. Chief Executive Officer Jensen Huang’s wealth tumbled the most ever after a rout in chip stocks and a report that the US Justice Department sent the tech firm subpoenas as part of an escalating antitrust probe.

Huang’s net worth slumped about $10 billion to $94.9 billion on Tuesday, the biggest single-day dollar drop for him since the Bloomberg Billionaires Index began tracking his wealth in 2016. The plunge followed a 9.5% drop in the shares of the chipmaker he co-founded. A spokesperson for Nvidia declined to comment.

The success of Nvidia’s products — along with struggles by rivals to field alternative chips — made the firm a crucial part of the supply chain for some of the biggest companies in the world. The DOJ is now sending legally binding requests that oblige recipients to provide information, according to a Bloomberg News report citing people familiar with the investigation. This makes the government a step closer to launching a formal complaint.

Antitrust officials are concerned that Nvidia is making it harder to switch to other suppliers and penalizes buyers that don’t exclusively use its artificial intelligence chips, according to the people.

Huang is the world’s 18th richest person and his wealth has grown by $51 billion year-to-date, even after the sharp drop on Tuesday, according to the index.

He was raised in Taiwan and Thailand before emigrating to the US, where he co-founded what became now the world’s third-biggest firm by market value in 1993.

In response to questions about the probe, Nvidia said its market dominance stems from the quality of its products, which deliver faster performance.