> NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) Board of Directors announced today that Jensen Huang has resigned as President, Chief Executive Officer, and a member of the Board, effective immediately.
Jensen Huang gone as President, CEO, and a member of the Board of Nvidia, effective immediately.
The Nvidia coup operation has been completed. It is over.
It's kinda crazy to me to point at open weights here when we got proof of foreign interference of this kind. The case for considering China a fair or respectable actor in this regard is now absolutely dynamited.
This proves that not selling to China was a good idea, and throws into question every narrative pointing otherwise. It also should make it evident that yes, China is most certainly spreading propaganda regarding these points, there's just no way it's not happening.
Because he cheated on his wife?? Or what am I missing? If that's the official reason, I don't buy it. I don't think those who can influence this decision give two shits about this type of morality. It's silly on its face. Obviously it's cover for some other agenda. I'm just surprised people buy this silly excuse instead of getting to the bottom of what is really happening.
No, it's because he repeatedly lied. 20% of the company's profits were/are coming from selling sanctioned chips to China and he said 0% 0% 0% (in official filings)
The news made it sound like she was a sophisticated person using him as a simpleton, but if anything he was using her to move his products against sanctions.
That he conspired to smuggle NVIDIA GPUs into China to bypass a US embargo working with the Chinese government via a spy (either willingly or via blackmail). Impropriety adds insult to injury - the board have rightly seen that the market will view it more negatively if he stays than if he leaves.
It's only been like a year since the last CEO resigned for viral infidelity.
And that was only with a subordinate, not a subordinate AND with a foreign spy (alleged). Reports say China got billions in chips imported thanks to this operation.
Politicians also drop like flies. The only person impervious to consequences has been Trump. None of his supporters care that he's the devil.
Not sure about the people thinking he didn't do much wrong.
The point is that as CEO of a company you have a fiduciary duty to have the best interest of a company in your actions and behavior.
Having sex with your workers and chinese spies is obviously not the kind of behavior that reflects that.
And if companies did not fire their CEOs over such blatant missteps the wrong message would be sent to the whole corporate America.
It sucks because obviously Nvidia would be nowhere without Jensen, and it's not like he killed someone or committed fraud, but the mistakes have been huge none the less.
And don't forget that those are the two cases we know about, but when you see 2 ants in your kitchen there's always more.
And the internal investigation of Nvidia quickly assessed that the issue was bigger and Jensen was more of a liability than an asset.
But yes, the fact that Nvidia advocated for relaxing exports to China and that he sold billions of GPUs to shady Singaporean companies is now obviously under major scrutiny.
I think he clearly did something wrong. It just doesn't seem that bad in comparison to the current shit our leaders do weekly. We're in an age of morally corrupt leadership across the board in the United States.
And the way to fix that is to start holding leaders accountable. So the insistence that it's wrong to somehow hold Jensen accountable here is a pretty absurd angle for the exact "But but but we don't hold leaders accountable here" people to take.
You want leaders to be held accountable? Look, a leader who clearly made bad and dumb and wrong choices, and a simple opportunity to celebrate them facing accountability. Can you support that?
I agree. And to the conspiracy theorists: what is more likely? That an impossibly rich guy who thinks he is the center of the universe does something as entitled as this? Or that there is some shadowy coup going on that just checkmated him? Human nature doesn’t need that much encouragement.
I never mentioned cheating? Not sure why are you bringing it up.
I said that the missteps was having sex with subordinates and chinese spies.
Now start connecting the dots with Nvidia being one of the major advocates for relaxing exports to China and selling billions of GPUs to shady Singaporean companies that the chinese spy represented and you understand why the board finds him a liability.
Even the "chinese spies" is just unsubstantiated 'she's chinese so she should be a spy". She's not even chinese iirc, isn't she singaporean? so it's like suspect by ethnicity.
Suspect by payment from ... TenCent? AFAIK. Her company got money from Tencent and after every longer meeting with Jensen, someone from Tencent flew in and had a meeting with her. At least that is what I remember hearing.
In Wikipedia no mention of TenCent at all. In another writeup it's mentioned, but nothing clear.
Was Alice's company supposed to be the only company getting Nvidia chips (which they deny doing anyway). Or one of many and Chinese companies did it with many different others?
If many, why is her relationship specifically important or special from that aspect?
Again, I can understand snooping for confidential early information from him. But "she got with him so that this single company gets chips"?
If it was some middle manager who got fired for screwing a subordinate you'd see the typical "don't shit where you eat" comments.
My guess is people are upset because their stock is down 20% over the last month because of this drama.
I think both nvidia AND jensen will be doing quite fine 5 years from now.
He resigns so he would forfeit much of contractual severance in most cases. A negotiated settlement is likely as part of the resignation and if he’s rehired elsewhere (eg at terafab or tsmc) it will generally terminate ongoing payments, healthcare, access to private aircraft and security.
My understanding is that NVidia's organisation is very flat and Huang has his fingers in every pie; he's not the hands off type. Moreover there was no succession plan. I get that having an affair with a spy is not great but isn't it risky to replace him now?
I'm going to guess the 2nd affair with a direct report who rose quickly through the ranks is from the board's perspective the more egregious of the two failings.
And: the public only knows what's made it out. Who knows what else has come out in private.
Oh come on, having sex with a coworker is rape now? This is getting ridiculous. Why not just go the whole way and require all sexual activity to come with with a signed and notarized consent form?
No? Having sex with a coworker is not rape, and no one said nor insinuated it was.
Go forth and consensually bang your coworkers. Knock yourselves out.
When you have the ability to fire or promote someone, however, you hold significant power over their life -- potentially impacting their ability to eat, house themselves, etc. In those cases, it's valid to ask, "Is there a possibility someone is being coerced into sex because they can't afford to say no?"
This is question of consent. It's not an allegation of rape. It's only a question and there are probably times the answer is no.
You don't have to knee jerk react to someone pointing out an obvious potential conflict of interest and go "so everything is rape now?"
You don't think the board of a listed company care about the CEOs bit on the side is being promoted? That's really not a good look for a company to admit that.
It's one thing to happen and another to put that out in the open.
Officials are corrupted? CEOs sleeping with other women including his subordinates? Snow is white? What's the deal? People at that level are basically playing politics, not laws.
However, the fact that someone decided to release all those information as PUBLIC, and followed that up with ANOTHER scandal, means that they are determined to get rid of them. As you said, it is indeed serious matter.
As the Chineses say: "Something weights as light as a quarter of pound if it's left alone, but can weight a thousand tons if put on the scale".
Because reality deems that this is not really the problem, I was about to mention the Epstein thing -- everything in that file is 100x worse than what Jensen did.
If we (the common people) really want consequences, we will need to do a LOT more and put things in our own hands instead of relying on our representatives -- oh but that's too populist for HN's taste.
> we will need to do a LOT more and put things in our own hands instead of relying on our representatives -- oh but that's too populist for HN's taste.
I'm with you on the first half, and see the second half changing. The fever may have broken in the US electorate.
Imagine having to explain that line of reasoning to Congress in four months. "Yes, Senator, we know our CEO was facilitating chip smuggling to China while in a relationship with a Chinese spy, but we figured that it would just be too risky to replace him at this time."
I feel like "not having a succession plan" should be a fireable offence on its own.
Otherwise you end up thinking "should I start an affair with this Chinese spy I've been breaking US laws with? What are they going to do, fire me? They can't, I've got them trapped so I'm untouchable, I can do whatever I want. And if I'm in a helicopter crash then it sucks to be them, I'll not care when I'm dead".
Would anyone bat an eye for “one admitted affair”? It is the “spy, Chinese, export ban, a blonde” caught on. No evidence whatsoever on these. It is the imagination of if you have “two ANT in the kitchen…”
I hope people understand that the affairs are not the reason he is being fired - NVIDIA has supposedly been skirting the export ban put in place by the previous administration. This was put in place for national security reasons. Whether you agree or disagree with the ban, it exists and Jensen&NVIDIA are in a world of trouble if this comes to light.
From all the reporting I've read, it is hard for me to avoid the conclusion that NVIDIA sold to China despite the export ban. I'd love to be wrong
The midterms seem like the most obvious timing. Trump has a little less power and everyone is starting to plan for what happens after him - jockeying for being able to say they didn't support this and that. If it was only being ignored because Mr Huang could donate a lot of money to Trump's ballroom that deal probably isn't as important now.
> What changed now compared to 2 years ago to make Trump care?
We all now know that Trump knew about it, that's what has changed. It was fine when this was private, but now his administration is starting to get questions around why his Commerce department punted the initial investigation to DOJ where it ultimately died as the opposition party is about to retake Congress with investigations top of mind.
Likely there was at least a feeling of mutual understanding between Jensen and key people in the administration. Now the wind has turned in a big way and none of that is on paper. And in fact what is on paper points in the wrong direction.
Probably the only thing protecting NVDA from prosecution right now is that nobody in the White House wants to pop the AI bubble. That might protect Jensen too because he would entangle the company. There will be an interesting tension with congressional oversight. Buy popcorn and NVDA vol.
Yeah, over a year ago the likes of Gamers Nexus was able to follow the clues to figure out how Nvidia was skirting the export ban.
It's hard to believe the US government was so incompetent that they didn't do the investigation a YouTuber did (But not impossible).
The export ban was always BS. Unless you are going to do a total ban and all parts are manufactured in the US, then it is just 1 additional hop to get stuff into China.
A lot of people in this industry have gotten it into their heads over the last 25 years that if you create enough value, you get to ignore things like "rules", "laws" and "common sense".
Part of me is hopeful after this. Huang did something that was, at the very least, profoundly stupid, and just short of treason at worst. However, I'm also filled with dread, because I know that this means that there will be even more of an effort by founders to make sure they're immune from consequences from boards if they go public. You already see this at Meta and with Zuckerberg.
We need real reforms on corporate governance that make this sort of situation - a board able to control the C-suite - the norm, not the exception.
> A lot of people in this industry have gotten it into their heads over the last 25 years that if you create enough value, you get to ignore things like "rules", "laws" and "common sense".
That's literally how the world works? And has worked for many centuries or longer. By "value" you mean wealth, and wealthy people can get away with murder. They buy and write the law and have the best lawyers in the world.
We won't have billionaires/trillionaires/kings AND rule of law for /everyone/ equally - the world doesn't work that way.
Our President literally diddled kids on a Carribbean island, cheated on his wives several times, and is probably a closeted homosexual, but richest man on earth having an affair is where we draw the line.
It could in principle though, and things certainly have not been improving in those respects. I'm not going to straight up say they are for sure getting worse either though. I mean, worse compared to when?
That being said, I think resigning yourself to this sort of behavior because "muh power and world works this way" is just kind of stupid. It is not in your best interests, as a regular person much like the vast majority of HN posters (besides the AI shill bots), to just be content with that state of affairs, if there are little things that are relatively effective at reducing those kinds of corruptions of social systems.
One of those things happens to be general distaste of an authentically Christian society against hedonistic behavior, but that has been on a noted downtrend lately, and I don't think that's been a very good thing. Similarly, I think Protestantism is to blame for a lot of nutty justification for the rich and powerful getting away with stuff like this, but I'm going to be vague about what I mean by that because it would be an essay length post.
Its a threat to their own companies and whatever amount of democracy is there. Maybe ego is like some cancer that kills/self-ded
structs its host/person if it gets big enough. Which is good. A persons etreme wealth gets them political power and also advantages before the law. We've seen this with big corporations.
TBH, I find the manner in which this was done to be pretty distasteful.
The US government initiating action against Nvidia for breaking the law, causing the affair to come to light? Yeah, that'd be fine by me. Somebody inside that government tattling tales to the NY Times, possibly with tacit consent of their superiors? That I have concerns with.
I've seen a theory floated online that somebody inside the government, who was part of the faction advocating for stricter sanctions on China, leaked this in a way to cause maximum damage to the anti-restrictions faction. Whether Huang (female Huang) was actually a Chinese spy in the first place is also up in the air, keep in mind that while the affair has almost certainly occurred, given that Huang (male) has admitted to it himself, the Chinese spy allegations are still unverified. It could possibly have been a "grain of truth in a sea of lies" play.
> The US government initiating action against Nvidia for breaking the law, causing the affair to come to light? Yeah, that'd be fine by me. Somebody inside that government tattling tales to the NY Times, possibly with tacit consent of their superiors? That I have concerns with.
Everything only comes to light with the New York Times reporting on it. It would be fine if the government did it, but... they didn't.
If nothing else, this indicated to the board that JH is capable of thinking with his dick and that can be a problem for business.
> if you create enough value, you get to ignore things like "rules", "laws" and "common sense".
Hmm... I wonder why that is. Could it be because a bunch of CEOs, prominent politicians, and business people were found to have taken multiple trips to an island where the had sex with children and nothing happened to them? No, it couldn't possibly be that. I'm sick of the pearl clutching against a man who had consensual relationships with adult women his own age, while we excuse pedophilia.
> I'm sick of the pearl clutching against a man who had consensual relationships with adult women his own age,
Do we have evidence that his legally-recognized other half consented to these relationships? If so, fine. That still doesn't remove the problems with those relationships, like the possibility of Alice Huang being a PRC intelligence asset, or the fact that one of the affairs was with a company employee, which can, in a roundabout way, place potential penalties on her career if she doesn't consent.
>while we excuse pedophilia.
Excuse me, where the f*ck did I excuse pedophilia???
You don't have to censor 'fuck.' Anyways, we excused it by not rising up. There was the token online outrage and then the story blew over. Unfortunately the individual is part of the group, so we're all guilty by association.
> That still doesn't remove the problems with those relationships
In this day and age of no-fault divorce, co-parenting, etc, where is this moral outrage coming from for a man cheating on his wife / girlfriend? I'm just so confused TBH. 'Legally-recognized other half'.... in no jurisdiction is it illegal to cheat on your wife.
> like the possibility of Alice Huang being a PRC intelligence asset,
The sole evidence that she is a Chinese intelligence asset is that she is Chinese.
> he fact that one of the affairs was with a company employee, which can, in a roundabout way, place potential penalties on her career if she doesn't consent.
Forgive me for not feeling sorry for a likely deca, probably centi, millionaire. This is not some secretary intern.
> Excuse me, where the f*ck did I excuse pedophilia???
Because, if we're going to be witchhunting CEOs for their personal lives, there are a helluva lot worse people than Huang that need to go.
> In this day and age of no-fault divorce, co-parenting, etc, where is this moral outrage coming from for a man cheating on his wife / girlfriend? I'm just so confused TBH. 'Legally-recognized other half'.... in no jurisdiction is it illegal to cheat on your wife.
If Huang had just slept with someone other than his wife, it wouldn't be a story. The outrage here isn't from the fire-and-brimstone perspective. I'm a single guy in my mid-30s; even here in Middle America there are plenty of people who practice ENM, no-fault divorce, and coparenting. It's now widely recognized that people aren't necessarily monogamous as soon as they get married.
At the same time, it's still an expectation that one should not do that sort of activity behind a spouse's back. It could result in other issues that could cause them issues, like STIs, or planning life around a child they didn't expect, or estate planning complications. Being open with your partner in life about the feelings you have on the matter is important, and puts the "ethical" in "ethical non-monogamy".
We don't know what the Huangs' arrangement was. I hope it was understood between them, and that all of that was sorted. If not, well, Jensen's going to get to deal with the fallout with that. Which brings us to the problems with the relationships themselves.
> The sole evidence that she is a Chinese intelligence asset is that she is Chinese.
Let's be honest here: that's not enough to get a story going in 2026. There's the fact that she set up a company in Singapore that had revenue figures that far outpaced what's expected for a company of its age, and the fact that they may have helped Chinese interests dodge US export restrictions on Nvidia's products. This was important enough that it was known to Nvidia corporate and the US government. You don't get attention like that just by dating someone from China.
> Forgive me for not feeling sorry for a likely deca, probably centi, millionaire. This is not some secretary intern.
Cultures like this impact everyone. Do we know if the executive was promoted or otherwise benefitted because of her relationship with Jensen? No, but it immediately opens up a conflict of interest for any request she has of the c-suite.
At worst, Huang was operating a Weinstein-like casting couch for roles within the company. If you can make an executive have to perform those sorts of actions in order to advance in her career, what does the secretary intern have to put up with?
> Because, if we're going to be witchhunting CEOs for their personal lives,
This isn't a witchhunt for the reasons stated above. It's SV, bud. People do all sorts of non-traditional relationship arrangements. Hell, even the Alice Huang affair was probably passable once the next news cycle hit. When he's sleeping with people who report to him, it's a problem on its face. It's unprofessional and it makes everyone at the company wonder just what they'll have to do to get ahead.
> there are a helluva lot worse people than Huang that need to go.
We can actually take care of both groups of people. That is actually possible, believe it or not.
I'm sorry this is insane. Why is it moral to divorce your partner unilaterally (which by necessity is behind your partners back) while cheating is somehow worse. This is retarded pearly clutching to think one is good and the other wrong. Bunch of hypocrits, the lot of you.
Not the _only_ reason, sure. However, it's quite common when executives have an affair they will get fired. I think that's just the reality. If you publicly humiliate your family and the business, you're out...
> If you publicly humiliate your family and the business, you're out
There is no "* only applies to publicly traded companies". Hence, it is incorrect.
The bigger point I am trying to make here being that not everything is investor-driven. People can run businesses without that. It annoys me greatly that HN regularly forgets that.
Several publicly traded companies have (or had) majority-owner CEOs, which makes it more than a little awkward for the board to fire them. I can't really see the board outing Zuckerberg under similar circumstances
In publicly-traded companies, the board is not the ultimate boss, though. That would be the shareholders. And, at Meta and many companies copying Meta's playbook who have IPO'd since (notably including Anthropic, though notably not including Nvidia), founder shares have so much voting power that the founders are effectively in complete control.
In theory, Nvidia shareholders, if dissatisfied with today's decision, could vote to oust the current board and replace it with people more sympathetic to Huang, who would, as their first decision, re-hire him as CEO, as would be their prerogative. This is... unlikely to happen.
Public companies in the US are required to have a board of directors. If they’re not a “controlled company” - i.e. no single person controls more than 50% - then a majority of the board are required to be independent, i.e. not employees, executives, or consultants to the company.
Reminds me of the Coldplay concert couple, which happened to be a CEO and head of HR. Head of HR! And what's more interesting is that they only got removed when the affair became public. At the same time the company was small potatoes so presumably less interesting to state actors.
> His open letter about his infidelity seems to imply he has embarrassed his wife and family, have you read it?
He has also said so very many times in so very many ways that Nvidia was absolutely not involved in violation of export control laws regarding the export of its products to China. That -in fact- there was absolutely no smuggling going on and claims to the contrary were utterly baseless and without merit.
I agree with ohnnyApplePRNG's assertion that we know literally nothing about the private life and situation of Mr. Huang and his family.
> So because he lied when he denied certain allegations, you don't believe his admissions of guilt?
He repeatedly and aggressively lied about violating export restrictions. "Our chips aren't potato chips. These GPUs weigh two tons. [So, how would you smuggle those? It'd be impossible!]" is an especially memorable deflection of his. He's obviously very willing to lie about very serious things when doing so is beneficial.
> He "literally" wrote about how his actions hurt his family...
He also spoke and wrote about how it was impossible to smuggle Nvidia hardware into China, and that everyone who was claiming that smuggling was going on were liars. CEOs will often lie when issuing Obligatory Standard Statements, whether they be brusque dismissals of accusations of the company's wrongdoing, or assertions of how shameful they consider their behavior that lead them to do whatever it was that they've been caught doing. CEOs make the expected public statement and get on with their lives.
Plus, given how most folks are -at best- confused by and -at worst- enraged by things like polyamory, why on earth would he publicly reveal it if his family was actually totally okay with regular extramarital sex and romance?
No, situations like this get the Standard Admission of Deep Shame and Regret For All The Harm Caused, regardless of whether or not what's said has any resemblance to what the family feels about the situation. The only folks who know how the members of the family feel about this are folks who actually know the family.
> We know literally nothing about Jensen's private life or if he humiliated his family here.
Uh... but we do!
---
I owe my family and all of you an apology.
I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry.
Throughout my life, my family has given me love and support. They deserve my honesty and loyalty. Instead, I let them down and damaged the life we built together. I take full responsibility for what I did and the hurt I caused, and I accept the criticism that comes with it.
To my wife and family: I love you. I know an apology cannot undo what I have done. I hope our family will heal and that, over time, I can earn back your trust.
To my colleagues at NVIDIA, including those I have worked alongside for decades, and to our board, partners, and shareholders around the world: you deserve better from me. Leading NVIDIA is the privilege of my life. My responsibility is to serve you and be worthy of your trust. I have fallen short of that responsibility. I am fully committed to NVIDIA and will work to earn back your confidence.
Regarding the national security concerns raised in news reports, NVIDIA’s Board of Directors has initiated an independent investigation. I support the investigation and will cooperate fully. I love our country and our company. I am committed to protecting NVIDIA and supporting America’s national security. I am proud and grateful to be an American.
My family bears no responsibility for my choices. I do. Please give them privacy.
If he is actually a bi-furry with an understanding with his wife on 'affairs', do you think he'd say that? Or would he maintain the straight, family-friendly, investor-friendly front expected of him [by some people] in his position?
Don't get me wrong, I'm very much a promoter of monogamy.
I think it is naive to assume that such public statements are the whole truth of a matter.
People who fuck up a company (or have an affair, or get caught snorting drugs off a sex-worker) aren't really 'stepping back to spend more time with their families'. Historically the classic example of executive public statements.
Perhaps, but it's also more common than not for affairs to hurt families, and the statement confirms that applied here.
If you have stronger evidence that the statement was untruthful when it said he hurt his family, you may present it.
Until such time, the statement strengthens the bayesian prior, which is that his affairs hurt his family, and thus that is what we can conclude. We need not be 100% confident to conclude this absent further evidence. >50% confidence suffices.
100%. While I do not condone his actions, publicly we do not know anything about his private life and the dynamics. Until there's a statement from his family, for all we know they may have been separated.
It's clearly the CN link and/or the cosying up with a customer that is the problem; the board would not care about his private life (and neither should the public, tbh).
And the open letter sounds more like it was written the way the public would expect a CEO to write.
If he was in an open relationship or had a girlfriend while separated from his wife, that's not really something to be embarrassed about. His letter talks is him apologizing to his family and asking for forgiveness. He got caught in a Chinese intelligence honeypot and knows he fucked up.
Which is as it should be. First of all, marriage is a covenant. If someone cannot be trusted to keep his word on that, it's tough to trust him with power over thousands of employees and trillions of dollars. Second, I'm guessing the board asked Huang after the first affair's revelation whether there were more skeletons in his closet, and he said no. Lying to one's board is more than enough reason to be ousted.
That's a very narrow view that's a function of one's religion, culture, and values.
When I was in school, (US) my very Catholic French teacher explained that his uncle, in France, had a mistress. His uncle's wife knew and was okay with it. What my teacher was explaining is that the culture around marriage varies considerably through the world, and you can't take for granted that what we were taught (monogamy) is the standard that others live to, or even expect from you.
Yes, I can. The normalcy of a thing doesn't make it right. But this isn't really about whether absolute cultural relativism is appropriate or not. It's about a man who broke his word. Huang wed an American woman in America, not a French woman in France. Nothing about this situation indicates Huang's wife was remotely aware of nor alright with his philandery.
My mother had gotten "two wrongs don't make a right" through my head by about age four. It's still true. I don't know nor care what they're doing in San Jose.
Seems like what they’re doing in North America kind of undercuts your assumptions.
Perhaps it’s you that is out of touch?
Both partners in this case know and/or participate, you don’t want drama at your games night after all. There is no wrong here, it turns out that many partners like seeing their partner have a great time.
There's no major American subculture in which stepping out on your wife is "a good thing" or even "an okay thing". A vast majority of Americans poll consistently against adultery and it's often the most universally condemned action in surveys. Here's one example: https://news.gallup.com/poll/692801/adultery-cloning-seen-im...
> There's no major American subculture in which stepping out on your wife is "a good thing" or even "an okay thing".
No, there isn't.
There is a significant part of American culture that separates personal life from professional life. IE, an affair is treated as a private matter to be handled by the married (or committed) couple. (IE, this is why many people in this thread focus on Huang's job performance over the affair.)
And I agree with the latter: The affair is a matter between Huang and his wife; it's a signal of his trustworthiness and honesty, and raises concerns about national security. But beyond that, it's not my place, or your place, to judge.
He is an immigrant, he holds dual citizenship in Taiwan, and regularly travels there.
I didn't go so far as to find out if he married in the US or elsewhere, or if his wedding was Christian.
What I do now is that in some cultures in that part of the world, it is acceptable for a man to visit a prostitute during a business trip. It's not something I condone.
I should also point out that in the US, there's no standard wedding vows! I don't think you know what vows Huang made with his wife; nor do I think you know what their expectations were in their relationship.
Seems like some weird fundamentalist take. On its own it's purely a private matter between him and his wife (obviously the GPU smuggling stuff is a separate thing). Given that the affair has been semi public for years it's hard to imagine his wife didn't know about it anyway.
If it's fundamentalist to hold a man to his word, then I suppose you can count me a fundamentalist. If he'll shatter trust with the person he purportedly loves most in the world, just what might he do to you, the customer or shareholder?
> shatter trust with the person he purportedly loves most in the world
Well we don't know that, you are not legally required to love someone you are married to and I have no clue what their relationship is like or whether they have any sort of "arrangements". I could hardly care less really since its their private matter.
> just what might he do to you, the customer or shareholder?
I don't really see a correlation between those things. All sorts of immoral degenerates (e.g. Musk, (potentially) Gates and I assume plenty of other lesser known CEOs) have generated massive amounts of value for their shareholders.
From a religious perspective, sure. From an earthly perspective, you don't know what the other side was doing. Have you ever been married to a menopausal or a post menopausal woman? A marriage in which there is a permanent refusal to have sex can be annulled.
> A marriage in which there is a permanent refusal to have sex can be annulled.
That’s not quite true. A more accurate statement would be: A marriage may be annulled in some U.S. states if one spouse entered the marriage with a concealed, permanent intention not to consummate it, and that intention constitutes fraud going to the essence of the marriage.
If the couple was having sex after marriage, and then one partner decided to cease having it some time later, that is generally not grounds for annulment.
If it were permitted, this would make many, if not most, late-stage marriages subject to annulment. People get sick and injured or just incapable in old age.
I was on the leadership team of a startup that is now public, during that build something like that happened (almost exactly the same as this NVIDIA situation sans the spy stuff), there were effectively 5 of us involved in what the outcome should be and it basically came down to: me and another guy didn't want to sit on a leadership team with someone who exercised judgement that way, to the point that it was me and the other guy or affair person, so affair person was out, even tho it was very painful for the business. Also, I don't think what I just described is particularly uncommon.
Yeah it's insane how many people are like "bro affairs are totally normal!" (they're not) or "affairs have nothing to do with the business!" (of course they do)
Look at the NVDA stock chart. There you go! That's why affairs are relevant to business! Business is always about trust, and someone who isn't deserving of their own spouse's trust certainly isn't deserving of anyone else's.
> Yeah it's insane how many people are like "bro affairs are totally normal!" (they're not) or "affairs have nothing to do with the business!" (of course they do)
Why?
I'm playing a bit devil's advocate here, but why? Because society think it's bad and a leader should be associated with positive views? Because if they got caught they are not smart enough to be the leader?
Why just this specific thing is to be considered? Why, for example, all the Musk's "extravagances" are not ground for a CEO termination? I'm pretty sure many other CEOs have many of those "extravagances" and manage to keep their position but yet, if you have an affair, you're 100% toasted.
Going through dating, marriage, having children, growing a family, co-parenting children is a massive time and emotional investment (for most people who take it seriously). A large part of, at least Western, society is built on this concept of spousal trust. It's part of the tax code, its part of the legal code (spousal privilege), it's part of our moral fabric, it's a cornerstone of many religions. Breaking that is a huge betrayal of our collective societal moral understanding.
All this coming from a country that elected twice as President a guy that married three times, led a very sexually promiscuous life, including the notorious boasting, and was accused of sexual misbehaviours by almost 30 women. Hilarious.
The US system gives voters two options for president. Those options are chosen by parties, and parties make terrible choices.
In 2016, the choice was between Trump and Clinton. Clinton famously excused her husband's infidelity by calling the long list of women who claimed they were assaulted as "a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty".
In 2024, the choice was between Trump and Harris. Harris got into politics by being the mistress of a CA governor.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if the US presidential election offered a choice between someone who was moral and someone who was as immoral as our existing political class. But that has not happened in my lifetime, and I don't expect that to change.
Right, and because he was willing to break a commitment that serious it de-values other commitments he's made, including those more directly relevant to the business.
It's not true that if you have an affair you're 100% toasted. And CEOs do get ousted for non-affair-like drama all the time.
But anyway a person's character is not cleanly separable between personal and professional life, so yeah affairs add (many) points to the "not to be trusted" column.
> Business is always about trust, and someone who isn't deserving of their own spouse's trust certainly isn't deserving of anyone else's.
Musk controls his companies stock and can't be fired. If that wasn't the case I think his situation would be very different - he's an outlier in most ways. But there's no board to enforce anything on him.
> Why, for example, all the Musk's "extravagances" are not ground for a CEO termination?
This has less to do with the relative social morality of his behavior, and rather that he has more control over the boards of his companies, and his personality represents a larger percentage of the perceived values of his companies.
Meaning that the desire and leverage for shareholders or the board to actually punish him is significantly less. Shareholders would potentially be evaporating trillions in speculative market value that is not backed up by Tesla or SpaceX's actual business fundamentals.
And any shareholders who disagree with his behavior have had plenty of time to leave and take their earnings by now, which means that the remaining shareholders are a self-selecting set who is okay with his behavior as long as it keeps making them money.
One part trustworthiness, one part likeability, one part risk aversion. Some companies have very unlikable CEOs but they are otherwise effective enough to get by.
In this case, Huang hit all three. Changing CEOs is also a good way to get the media coverage over faster, or at least change the narrative in the pubic (and investors) minds.
If it were just an affair, I doubt he would have lost his job. It wasn't, though, and the other circumstances- potentially dodging export controls and abusing a role of power over a subordinate- came with far too much heat, so to speak.
Also, affairs make for much more entertaining gossip than the other items, so it's probably natural that that aspect gets talked about more.
I think it often comes down to: do your actions match your words? In the instance above, when said exec joined our leadership team, they were well aware of the standard of conduct we expected, they agreed to them with their words, in fact. With us it was very simple, provided you're not a bigot, what you do on your own time is not our concern. However, what you do within our business is our concern. If you have intimate relations with anyone inside our company, even if consensual, you're no longer on our leadership team. Then, their actions did not match those words, when that is true, trust is gone. In society more generally I think this is true, there are people who we strongly expect their actions and words to match, and there are people who we know that isn't the case, and on some siding scale, we accept it (I didn't say acceptable). For example Fox News or CNN, marketing people, and to some degree apparently Elon Musk (in that people who matter to his success appear to believe they know where they stand with him). Groups typically have criteria/standards, if they change that, it may change the group to varying degrees, and that may be ok or not ok, depending on the group. I don't think this is an American thing or a European thing or anything like that, my understanding is this is a pretty human thing generally?
It is a conflict of interest same as any other. If there is no conflict of interest then the company won't care. As the CEO of the company every other employee works for him and in turn he has power over them.
Society will not like you (in the US), but nothing more will happen.
To that end, it's the secret and the reveal of that secret that's the issue for a leader. If a CEO is open about his socially-unacceptable behavior from the beginning, there's no shock to absorb.
Yep that's an even better point. Though I would say there's a distinction between socially-unacceptable and untrustworthy. Being forthcoming both limits surprise (per your point) and mitigates the trust component of deviance.
Considering that extramarital escapades didn't prevent the current US president from being elected twice - and quite recently at that - I'm pretty sure this has nothing to do with cultural acceptance.
You cannot tell from the NVDA stock crash if it's because the CEO had an affair, or because NVIDIA illegally sold GPUs to China and is in huge trouble.
I can't see how the stock is highly inflated with a P/E of 20 and expected +100% year over year quarterly results expected in a few days. Normally companies doubling their revenue or profit (not sure which is what the expectation is here) are priced rather higher. A P/E of 20 is what I would expect for Coca-Cola, since it is going to grow at about population rate, since about everyone who wants to drink a Coca-Cola product is already doing so. (KO is currently 28, which I think is high, probably from people rotating out of tech)
I have worked at a larger company where the CEO did something similar and across the company all anyone could ask was "why would you do something that dumb", which is not a great way for people to feel about the person supposedly leading the company.
Well, I'm not pro-affair, but I've seen lots of people say "why would you do something that dumb" about lots of executives, doing regular things like changing marketing plans, changing the color of the logo, choosing clearly inferior technology because of the caste of the chief architect, etc.
At the end of the day, it's also just too simplistic.
Humans don't have some kind of overall "morality" or "judgment" setting that applies equally to all areas of life, where a failing in one area translates to failings in other areas.
You can be an amazing CEO and a terrible father. You can have the best judgment in the world around mothering, and abysmal judgment in business. Most importantly, you can be totally trustworthy in the realm of business, yet not in romance.
The idea that there is this binary switch, where someone is either perfectly trustworthy in all contexts, or else you can no longer trust them in any context, is just not an accurate understanding of how real human beings work. It's not supported by modern psychology.
yes, that exactly the point. i want my colleagues to behave correctly on the job - i don't care if they have 3 boyfriends or cheat on their partner. it's not the point. it can be fun to gossip around the coffee machine, but that's about it. nobody should be fired for having an affair.
This is more than an affair though. This is an affair with someone he has a business relationship with and thus it becomes the interest to the business. There are many many cases where someone give business favors to the person they are having an affair with.
My company is willing to hire my wife, but she wouldn't be allowed to work for me, nor I her.
If he’d had an affair with his physical therapist absolutely no one would care and he wouldn’t be out- it’s the totality of his actions and his extreme lack of judgement at issue.
The affair isn't the issue, or at least not the only issue, it's who he had the affair with.
At the end of the day Jensen chose to have an affair with a senior officer of a company strongly suspected of bypassing trade restrictions and should have known that it would be a terrible look for Nvidia and himself. Even if he didn't suspect her of being an agent of China, even if he didn't believe the allegations against Mega speed, even if he had no intentions of passing confidential information or aiding in bypassing trade restrictions. He knew it would carry the appearance of all those things.
"you can be totally trustworthy in the realm of business, yet not in romance."
If you can't adhere to the terms of a voluntarily-entered personal contract with a person to whom you've promised utter faithfulness, why should I believe you'll be trustworthy with regard to some boring, impersonal business contracts?
It's perfectly possible to be trustworthy in one thing and not the other. If you can't trust a lion with your flock of sheep doesn't mean you can't trust it with a bunch of bananas.
All (or nearly all) fortune 500 company has a rule against sleeping with a subordinate, and it is one of the most common reasons for a CEO to be fired. If all we learned about was the second affair, I still expect he would have been fired. So every single successful actor has arrived at the same conclusion, but you don’t understand why. This is a great opportunity to learn something new.
Tell me you have no clue how corporations are run without telling me. Furthermore Jensen wasn't some random executive otherwise this wouldn't be now top news all over the world.
Maybe people are tired of that bullshit. The most powerful guy in business clearly felt empowered to let that facade go. I guess he just got a check for his experiment.
They can when they reveal poor decision making. If this guy is so stupid that he's willing to stick his dick in anyone, including a Chinese spy, what does that say about his ability to make rational decisions elsewhere in his life? He's clearly not making decisions that benefit him personally in the long term so can he even make good long term decisions at his job?
There's a reason why government background checks looks at financial records. Someone that has trouble paying their bills due to a gambling habit might be easy to turn by the enemy with some cash. Or someone that regularly cheats on their wife might be willing to do some favors for a pretty girl if she lets him sleep with her.
Getting obviously played so hard that it makes you, your wife, your children, your company and your entire country look like idiots surely should humiliate your business no?
One of the reasons this behavior is problematic in general is the potential for blackmail. It's not even really a statement about morality, just an acknowledgement that somebody who wants to keep things hidden is going to be beholden to the people who know the secrets.
Jensen went to many high profile parties with this woman. I don't see where he's trying to even hide it. Even the kiss was made out in public, not like a hotel room.
Also, an affair is only blackmail material in a society of prudes. I recall the story about a president who was confronted with condemning photos of his activities by CIA agents, and he pretty much encouraged the agents to publish the photos.
> Also, an affair is only blackmail material in a society of prudes.
You don’t have to be a prude to think cheating on a spouse is condemnable.
In general, it also doesn’t really matter what society thinks. You can just threaten to reveal the affair to the spouse. And even in the case the spouse doesn’t really care it’s fodder they can potentially use in a divorce to get a better deal.
One thing worth pointing out is that in this case in addition to the affair with the Chinese spy he was allegedly having an affair with a subordinate, which is always problematic.
Apparently the KGB tried to honeypot him - and they were flabbergasted when he asked for copies of the photos. Apparently photos of him with multiple Russian women would bolster his machismo image back home?
Although if you read his Wikipedia page, he had many, many wives, some concurrently, and the youngest was 19...so it's probably true, lol.
Then you read about a certain EV company CEO and his escapades and repopulating the planet, and you don't know what to think.
Or Charlie Sheen...
I guess politicians, celebrities and CEOs are another world from us mere mortals.....
> Also, an affair is only blackmail material in a society of prudes
No? All it requires is for Jensen to want to remain with his wife and for his wife to be willing to divorce him if she finds out he has an affair.
Or, even if we suppose he doesn’t care about his wife’s feelings at all, he might be very incentivised by losing half of his assets in a divorce. It’s worth many, many millions to him.
This is the kind of story that makes me think most critical leadership should be held by women. Grossly generalizing here, but I think women are inherently less corruptible than men in this manner, especially older women.
It’s unambiguously a good thing that the next NVIDIA CEO (even if just an interim CEO) is a woman, and that the AMD CEO is a woman.
It's entirely possible that the board just wasn't that warm on Jensen in the first place. Not cold, not looking to be the tall poppy that gets cut down... but at least willing to give Jensen the boot if given the right push.
This is how things change. Slowly and then all at once. If the board were more in love with him, they'd probably have been willing to turn a blind eye for just a little while longer. No such luck for Jensen, but we make our own luck in these things.
I suspect so many of us see examples of corporate crime or even of corporate greed (legally) causing an incredible amount of damage that an affair feels trivial in comparison. That is especially true when the private family life of a CEO is private. The damage of the affair could be anything from devastating to the family to they were all but legally separated.
That doesn't change that there is a conflict of interest here and any company should fire someone who has a conflict of interest that they are not carefully managing to ensure they don't become real.
Famously, Mark Hurd made dubious expenses that were perceived negatively by the public (there were sexual harassment allegations) and was ousted as CEO from HP. Then Larry Ellison mocked HP and hired Mark as Oracle's President. So, some companies are worried about that, others aren't
It’s not just about humiliation. If your boss is sleeping with your coworker or someone on your team, how can you trust their decisions are grounded in fairness and logic. Sure, the world doesn’t work this way, and ceos are at a different realm than a mid level manager, but this is usually how HR defines things.
If you publicly humiliate your family and the business, you're out...
It's not entirely about humiliation.
Having an affair (or multiple, in this case) demonstrates poor decision making. You don't want someone who can't make wise choices running your company.
Let’s be real here. Everyone making money out of NVIDIA was more than happy enough to go around the restrictions and see the prices go up due to Chinese demand.
Having these people saying otherwise is pure hypocrisy.
In what world is the modern US Congress a good regulator of these kinds of things? Half the people in the Capitol have a literal vested interest in the very companies they claim to be trying to keep on a leash (and I recognize that some of these are inverse instruments, my point still stands).
Public service, especially at the highest levels, is both a realization of civic responsibility, as well as an immense material privilege.
If you've had a career in congress, parliament, whatever, you can live comfortably off of the various media appearances you're likely to have for much of the rest of your life.
Representatives in government should be able to keep it in their pants when it comes to investments at least while they're in government, and have a thick, thick wall between their jobs running a country (or state, or whatever) and the management of their investments. Blind trusts should be the bare minimum.
What I'd prefer to see is that while actively sitting in government, representatives must keep their savings invested in funds so diversified into low-risk instruments that almost no regulation can benefit them significantly more than it would an average passive investor.
My money is on the congress members - including the greatest stock trader of all times, Nancy Pelosi - having just sold their NVIDIA shares right before the spying was uncovered.
This link you posted, doesn’t work like you think it does - well, except on the part where she is shown to be beating the market by double digits every single year for the past decades.
She is up 934% since 2014. This congresswoman is the greatest financial genius in the all history of mankind. She was beating S&P steadily, every year and since 2014 she is up more than 600% compared to the S&P.
For context, the probable next best investor - after all these great financial minds in congress - is Warren Buffet, and he is actually down 34.8% compared to the S&P since 2014.
You will only know that Nancy Pelosi was up to since the beginning of October next January. Congress members only have to submit their trades (their SEC fillings) every 3 months. [1]
This link I posted, doesn’t work like you think it does. It shows trades which happened. It shows trades as recently as November 6th, which is after the end of the prior quarter.
It doesn't, however, show sales of nvidia stock prior to this release. Thus no such sales happened, unless you have any further evidence.
It is, however, looking like JH's fellow philanderer donald knew, and kept it under wraps for personal gain. Probably insider trading. I mean, just look at how much donald and his family's wealth has increased compared to the S&P500, or Warren Buffett.
No, it doesn't. You are either being purposefully obtuse in the argument, or now trying to go after the tail of it.
Congress members are not mandated to fill a trade as it happens. If Nancy Pelosi latest filling day was Nov 6 (as you are pointing out), it means that she is only forced to show trades up to 30 days before (and that is mostly what she does as her median filling delay is of 24 days).
Also, as you are so keen to bring Trump into the discussion for some reason. I must sadly tell you that the chap is only 4.4% up compared to S&P during all his history as a member of the government/representative. The guy is not nearly the same financial genius as Nacy Pelosy.
The thing you're missing is, the evidence doesn't have to meet your standards. It just has to be better than the nothing which you've put forward in the opposite. And it is! Pretty much anything beats nothing.
So now, the onus is on you to convincingly back up the allegations you're making regarding sales of nvidia stock, and you haven't. If you have some sort of evidence that Nancy made the trade alleged, and is delaying reporting, whether allowed or not, please share it.
The evidence is, however, looking like JH's fellow philanderer donald knew, and kept it under wraps, probably insider trading for personal gain.
I already proved that by pointing you to the numbers in your own link, that show that Nacy Pelosi is up 934% in her stock market trades since 2014, beating the S&P 500 by more than 600% in the same period.
Very much agreed, the second this became clear his position was untenable. He will surely have launched his unicorn by the end of December regardless, I’d be surprised if this had any tangible repercussions outside the divorce court.
Very much dislike that this in large part is overshadowed by his adultery, which should be considered separate and treated totally private, at least for the sake of his family.
The image of Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china while compromised by an allegedly Chinese agent is the real issue here. Endless congressional hearings on that topic starting in Jan. The Nvidia corp still has to answer for that even when Jensen is out.
I remember listening to that and thinking, this sounds like a guy who is primarily focused on selling chips and is brushing away legitimate concerns in a way that, I just did not find very compelling. A little bit too much protest you might say. Not to say there isn't or wasn't validity to his arguments, but in light of the current circumstances it seems to me that those arguments are quite a bit less valid than they were, and I've certainly swung my personal opinion from being on the fence to a hard no to selling these chips to Chinese buyers.
If the Chinese Communist Party are going through such great lengths to obtain these advanced Nvidia chips, it further invalidates a lot of what I've been reading here and elsewhere about China "catching up" or that being the leading models isn't what matters (commoditization). You don't do stuff like this unless you really need something.
But what’s the point ultimately? Delaying their progress by a couple years?
Not selling them chips virtually guarantees that they will learn how to make their own, very quickly. The end result of that is much, much worse for the USA.
(and could leave Taiwan in a much weaker position in the near future)
Who says we won't just progress as well and they stay behind a couple of years?
Where is the evidence that China is catching up considered a fiat d accompli?
Do you presume that China is destined to always at least catch up in every sector or field ever? That stinks of Chinese Exceptionalism to me.
If they could just "catch up" they would, and whether we sell them chips wouldn't matter because they would want to create their own Nvidia and export chips and make money too.
Models aren’t everything. You need physical infrastructure at scale for inference, which is where the economic power comes from. Chinese hardware makes double the heat and needs at least double the energy input.
Exactly. And we better keep it this way. The fact that we can block them from copying us today means that they will try that much harder to come up with their own answers. Remember, they are miles ahead in manufacturing hardware and the software is not a problem anymore. Whatever moat cuda represented is gone now.
> Do you presume that China is destined to always at least catch
> up in every sector or field ever? That stinks of Chinese
> Exceptionalism to me.
Suppose you want to build something that requires technical knowledge (a GPU, a fighter jet, ...). You have engineers, but they don't yet know how to build it.
If no one on earth has ever built this thing, you need to consider the possibility that it can't be done at a cost you can pay. Perhaps it violates some law of physics, or it can't be manufactured without knowing some chemistry/physics that we are 100+ years from discovering.
If a company in some other country is already building this thing, you can be sure it is possible to build it. That is a critical piece of information! It means you don't need to discover (much) new physics. It means you can buy/steal a working copy and look at it to learn about it. It means there are engineers you can hire/spy on to understand their design process. It means you can more easily convince a bank/government to fund development, as they have proof your goals are achievable.
Inventing a thing is much harder than inventing a clone of a thing. The idea that China doesn't have the people and organization to copy things other countries make is the opposite of Chinese Exceptionalism. It is the belief that the Chinese are uniquely incapable of engineering work. This is obviously not true.
> The idea that China doesn't have the people and organization to copy things other countries make is the opposite of Chinese Exceptionalism. It is the belief that the Chinese are uniquely incapable of engineering work. This is obviously not true.
Which broadly leads to two conclusions:
They can't do it. If they could they would. If you could invest and create your own Nvidia, ASML, TSMC, &c. you would do that especially if you are China due to its stated goals and actions it takes that we can all see toward those goals.
They can do it and so selling them the chips doesn't matter other than helping to speed up their ability to do it, so we don't want to sell them the chips and thus speed up their capabilities.
But your viewpoint also holds true for the United States and Europe. Anything China can do we can also do, otherwise you're just supposing Chinese Exceptionalism.
It feels like Space Race thinking, honestly. If the US delays China and ends up with an AGI god a few years in advance, that can still be a significant advantage even if China can catch up. This especially would hold true if a theoretical AGI could maximally leverage RSI so the improvement curve becomes exponential.
If the US or China developes an AGI that can leverage RSI, the game is over. It is over in the same way that WW3 is over as soon as the missiles are in the air: it doesn't matter who has the fastest or highest yield missiles, because there is a finite amount of time before there is nobody left to care about the advantages of one side. Except at least WW3 is over in about an hour, whereas an AGI could take years or decades to complete whatever thing it has been misaligned to desire.
AI alignment research is still in its alchemy era, and global cyber security is underfunded and bad. As a species, we simply do not have the tools to deal with AGI that can self-improve.
What stops another power from developing its own AGI a year or two later? Or from catching up once there are two competing RSI AGIs? The Soviets were a few years behind on getting nukes but they still got them.
AI has been identified as strategic national priority for both the Chinese and United States.
NVIDIA’s commercial interest is pretty clear… it’s beneficial to them. to sell everyone to maintain the dominance of CUDA. That is not necessarily the national interest. And remember that espionage and infiltration is not a one-sided affair, the US may well have the ability to sabotage Chinese development efforts. You just don’t know.
End of the day, corporate CEOs are very powerful, but they’re not as powerful as the government. My guess is that Jenson truly didn’t think that this individual was a spy, and figured that the questionable legality of chip exports to Chinese proxies could be addressed by ingratiating the administration.
No, they haven't. They spent the first decade after WW2 repairing the damage left behind by the Japanese and their Civil War. Subsequently they managed to starve tens of millions afterwards in several missteps, and then righted themselves.
They then spent three to four decades lifting about thrice the US population out of extreme abject poverty, and then in the last 20 years catching up. And catch up they have; they are already the leaders in green technology and EVs, already manufacture some of their own chips, already have indigenous military aerospace capability, which they are now expanding to civilian use. They make almost everything in the average household.
> Not selling them chips virtually guarantees that they will learn how to make their own, very quickly. The end result of that is much, much worse for the USA.
Are you proposing we guarantee access to avoid potential access?
Keeping them dependent upon you guarantees that they never surpass you and that you can milk the relationship for all its worth economically and geopolitically. When they have their own fabs spun up it's possible that you are the one eventually stuck with inferior tech, and you lose all sort of revenue + leverage you'd otherwise have from the relationship.
It make sense. China had X amount of demand. If the demand is met they are satisfied, if the demand remains unmet they seek alternatives. That seeking of alternatives primarily means huge amounts of money, that would go to Nvidia, going to direct competitors of Nvidia to "chip" away at their competitive advantage.
The long term result is the same regardless of who makes the chips but the real strategy is delaying China's ability to surpass the US. It takes a lot of time and money to essentially copy the entire infrastructure required to build an Nvidia GPU. Nvidia has enough demand as is.
China is a trading partner but there is still a serious catalyst for war in the form of the South China Sea. If we went to war with China in 5 years time, why would we sell them the tech they need to match our ability now? Let them figure it out on their own.
If the US wanted to delay "China's ability," wouldn't the strategy be to give them just enough GPUs to keep them reliant on Nvidia (and make developing alternative tech locally seem less critical), but not enough to develop superior models?
This isn’t what China does though, the moment new tech crosses the border they reverse engineer and start producing it locally. IP protections are meaningless there. How many times does this have to happen to sink in?
What needs to happen is that the people who are getting wealthy from the offshoring of manufacturing and labor to China need to stop getting wealthy. Until then any and all excuses to pretend that China will operate in good faith will be levied to try and make people seem like it's in their best interest to hollow out the USA to hand over to China.
The problem is, the man in the mirror and it ain’t just the Chinese that have taken advantage, the Japanese and the Koreans are pretty good too, and so are the Taiwanese and it’s only a matter of time for one or two countries in Southeast Asia to rise up too, and if it wasn’t for Russia’s stupidity, both Russia and the Ukraine would have certainly produced what three or four very, very good AI models to the mix…
Soon, China, if they aren’t already, will be the premier developer of Thorium reactors courtesy of Oak Ridge, Tennessee and they also are now number one or at the least 1A when it comes to high-speed rail, and if the Russians and the Ukrainians weren’t fighting each other, that high-speed rail probably would be already built out all the way to eastern Europe.
Huawei has become a super company basically because of all the sanctions, Wxmt will become the dominant memory maker worldwide in the next five years due to shortsighted thinking in the West.
People are bending over backwards to come to try to find some deep reason, but I think the reason is simple - the people in charge are not particularly farsighted nor insightful. It's simply short-term thinking without consideration of long-term consequences - it's not limited to just businesses.
For another example, the reason Chinese are not allowed on the 'international' ISS is because of the Wolf Amendment. [1] The idea was that if we just allowed them onto the ISS they'd steal all of our elite tech or something. Within a decade they had launched their own space station and carried out various revolutionary space activities.
And of course all of that happened while the ISS itself continues to deteriorate with no replacement in sight. And when China did an unprecedented sample return mission from the far side of the Moon and offered the whole world access to samples, US researchers had to jump through a bunch of hoops to receive them, again thanks to the same law.
This is good evidence sanctions don't really work. Critical sectors will find ways around them and it only punishes the rank and file working class. If China or any sanctioned nation wanted those nvidia chips, it has ways to get them. So the military and intelligence get them, but the people don't. Same with sanctions on Russia now, which has not significantly slowed its military machine, but in fact its military machine is coming out with constant innovations (new Gerans, better EW, more spy sats, etc). I remember seeing a post mortem of some Russian drone. It had a Jetson chipset Russia was not supposed to be able to get. I imagine the smuggling market is far bigger than we might think and sanctions far less effective than we think.
Same when you sanction food imports. The elites who make decisions will always be fed. Sanctions are almost always an attack on the working class who do not make the high-level political decisions the sanctions are trying to address. Not to mention the idea of "making life hard on them so they revolt" almost never works.
Sanctions should be a bigger conversation. They are almost never needed and especially trade tariffs and such are always used for the most corrupt cronyism.
> Same when you sanction food imports. The elites who make decisions will always be fed. Sanctions are almost always an attack on the working class who do not make the high-level political decisions the sanctions are trying to address. Not to mention the idea of "making life hard on them so they revolt" almost never works.
There’s also the minor quibble that restricting food exports to starve another country are illegal under international law.
Nobody is starving in Russia (at least unavoidably).
That sanctions only harm the civilian economy is not an argument against them. Kinetic sanctions agains oil refining are also primarily impacting the general population and the military have enough oil. But they still impact the ability of the Russians to fund the war. Civilian infrastructure and economic assets are used by militaries too.
China catching up does not mean they are not still behind.
Also, China is a big country with many companies. While some may be trying to catch up via local development, others may still prefer getting western hardware right now e.g. in order to get a competitive advantage over those catching up.
I'm a bit out of the loop, what part of what he said is wrong? He said they have more power and the more capability to produce chips, so they can essentially just brute force things vs the US if they wanted to: is that not the case?
No it's not the case because if they could do it they would already have done it. Selling them Nvidia chips doesn't change that.
But here's a link to the podcast episode if you want to give it a listen. It will inform a lot to the discussion taking place here and help you understand a few of the things he said that are probably now wrong: https://www.dwarkesh.com/p/jensen-huang
That's like asking why China is building nuclear and coal power plants when solar is so much cheaper. They are doing all of the above.
Let's assume for a second that the compromat story on Huang is true, how much would that have cost? It could be everywhere from 10k to 10m $, depending on how difficult it was to get access, but it would still be a rounding error for AI invest.
Chips aren't what maketh SI anyway. The US is ahead because of a trifecta of having the best (most) hardware, best data, and best talent. You might also throw in business culture. But the same way Google is leading from behind in the US AI eco system, China is behind the frontier on LLMs, but laying foundational work in robotics, multi-modal models and integrated factories that might prove a big advantage down the line.
Talking to friends who worked in diplomacy - honey traps are extremely common and often tried quite routinely. It makes sense if you think about it. The failure rate on these is going to be fairly high and even if it’s a small success (ie a one night stand sort of thing) you can get a little compromat. The cost is probably fairly negligible, a lot of this will be fairly low risk as far as spying goes.
also, men are redickulous. And they can go in any number of beneficial direction from turning informant, selling GPUs to the chinese, or just a pee tape, etc. Just like a lottery of fun ways to screw with an adversary.
> honey traps are extremely common and often tried quite routinely.
WSJ reports that U.S. intelligence says Chinese intelligence approached Alice to become an asset after she met Jensen in March 2024. So, she was an opportunistic info source, not targeted in advance.
My favourite honey trap story comes from the cold war. A Russian diplomat in Denmark was the target of Danish intelligence. They tried to honey trap him at a party, but he didn't respond to their agent's advances. So, the Danes supposed that he might be gay, and sent a male honey trap to the next party, but again got no response from the Russian. They shrugged their shoulders and gave it up.
Unbeknownst to them, the Russian was actually at that time trying to make contact with western intelligence, as he was keen to defect! He was just a bit too awkward to respond to flirting.
He did eventually manage to defect to Britain, and died in 2025. His name was Oleg Gordievsky.
I think it's worth remembering that China isn't a monolithic bloc, and CCP doesn't drive everything, that there are tons of private enterprises there that would benefit, even if the Chinese government strategically would prefer to push Huawei to grow the domestic capability. There being a ton of private demand internal to China doesn't invalidate Jensen's view that it's a strategic blunder to let Huawei get a foothold in the market. Within the CCP, there's also a lot of inter-regional competition to show growth in their own regions, because that's the primary qualification for advancement within the party.
That said, I don't have any special insight into the specifics of who was driving the demand backing Megaspeed.
Which part? You find it hard to believe that there are private enterprises there that don't always do exactly what CCP wants? Or that there're conflicting incentives inside the CCP, so that "what CCP wants" isn't simple?
there's a good analysis that says Alice was a fixer and/or white-glove. those are common-in-China roles that have to do with obfuscating big financial operations, not necessarily with any political (CCP) involvement. obviously, CCP approves, if tacitly, everything that happens in China.
Why are you posting random unrelated things? The comment you were responding to: "Jensen getting really heated when pressed by Dwarkesh over China during his interview". Jensen's push for China in some other interview where he didn't lose his composure is unrelated.
Is related to the subject of him being a chill for China. Anybody would guess the context, people dont need somebody to find the link to an interview being mentioned. But they will be interested in another similar one, and I posted it at the exact relevant second.
Now that I explained it in detail for you, shall we move on to addition and subtraction? Or do you need a short pause because your head is hurting you?
Watched the interview and as far as I see he was getting 'heated' because he was speaking the obvious truth and being frustrated by poorly informed questions.
This is entirely expected from somebody like him who has a long history of being on the right side of technical argument.
He is a huge loss to Nvidia and the US - replaced by a ex-CFO.
The US had put an export ban, and he clearly skirted it while at the same time banging a suspected Chinese spy. The company he ran like a fiefdom broke the rules set in place by the same country for which he's supposedly a loss.
I don't see it. Nvidia has a lot to answer for, and the fact that Jensen was very successful as a CEO does not shy away from the cracks in the structure.
Are we saying he was skirting the ban because he was having an affair with a Chinese spy? That seems like a stretch. Jensen was ideologically opposed to a ban, he didn't need any coaxing in that regard.
It was illegal, and I'm sure if this comes to light there will be (major) repercussions, but I don't see it as an immoral move.
However the fact he was having an affair muddies the waters on the two. At best, the optics look bad to someone outside. Yes, he could have been opposed for money reasons, and that’s a position that needs no more explanation.
But how do we know he wasn’t being whispered to by the smoking baddie he was trying to impress? Maybe he’d not have taken the risk were he not having this affair but we know what men do when their ego is on the line. Case in point: Musk paying people to play PoE for him and losing his shit when he was caught.
Do I think money is a good enough explanation? Yes. Could I believe that what’s in his pants also played a part? Also yes.
People at this level get intoxicated with their power. They think they are invincible and can do whatever they want. Often they can. Sometimes it all comes crashing down, here for example, or the case of Eric Swalwell. But they never think it will happen to them.
It would depend on the reason for the sanctions...
If the sanctions are to prevent buying the products of slavery, that's a moral issue, and violating the sactions is also a moral issue.
Same deal if the sanctions are to prevent selling things that will be used to carry out genocide/etc. That's a moral issue, so violating the sanctions is a moral issue.
I don't think there's an alegation that the GPUs will be used for immoral purposes, just that the US government has national security concerns. Those concerns may or may not be valid, and may or may not be served by having trade sanctions applied effectively, but I don't think that's a question of morality.
It's not de facto immoral to violate the law. It could be immoral to violate the law and conceal it.
I think you can make a case that breaking a rule intended to prevent immoral activity is in and of itself immoral, even if breaking the rule didn't result in the immoral activity.
It's arguable either way, morality isn't a formal logic. There's no right answer, and it's mostly judged by popular consensus... If there is a final authority, they don't publish their notes. :p
Isn't the specific trade law being broken related to arms control and dual-use technology?
IMO it's not a terribly strong case to make while Boeing sells whole jetliners to China, but the law was put in place for both moral and practical reasons.
Sure, why not? Morality and law are not always aligned. I'm not sure I would go so far to consider these sorts of trade sanctions "immoral", but I wouldn't fault someone for believing so.
In this case, though, I think Huang just believed these sanctions were the wrong move, and would end up long-term helping China and hurting the US. Which is fair to believe, but believing a law is counterproductive doesn't give you immunity if you break it.
The thing about that Lord Moulton said is that there are a bunch of things that are wrong that are not illegal, and we have to do that because people have to be capable of self-control. Patrick Deneen, in . . . The Failure of Liberalism said that he thinks liberalism is failing because it has come to the view that anything that is not illegal is moral.
It’s something you are not equipped to judge. You don’t know much about his private life and the private life of the people around him. Having sex in itself is not the problem, and so far what was demonstrated was that he had sex, at least one with an alleged spy evading trade sanctions, and once with a subordinate. Either are improper and ground for firing; both together are untenable (plus the possibility that there are other skeletons; we don’t know for now).
The relationship with his wife is neither here nor there, unless she wants to make it public. If she feels betrayed, wants a quick buck, or otherwise wants to for any reason, she will sue for divorce and, considering the publicity of the cases, she should get a favourable judgement.
It’s easy to impose our morals on others. But more than half of republicans believe that gay sex is immoral just as strongly as you believe that adultery is.
>>But he did not have an agreement with the justice department
Neither did conscientious objectors? I don't think you mean to claim that the justice department is the final word on morality? Just that on this topic, you agree with the justice department (which is fine), but they will do things that you disagree with. They are no final arbiter and have helped enforce plenty of immoral laws in the past.
There is even a case to be made that flooding the Chinese market with advanced GPU's will hamstring China's ability to build their own, just like they have done to our ability to manufacture. In fact that is exactly the case Jensen has made plenty of times. By holding back exports you are actually creating the market conditions in China for building advanced GPU's indigenously, CCP doesn't even have to do much, the market is responding. Who's immoral and unpatriotic then?
You say that as if a lottery assigns companies what product they shall make. Or that they found their product designs in a kinder egg.
They had an idea which they thought will be valuable. And they worked bery hard on making that idea a reality.
People complain that companies don’t have leadership with long term vision. The leadership of NVIDIA heard the idea of GGPU computation and put the resources behind the idea to make it a practical reality. Here the gap between “nerdy idea” to “product sells like hot-cakes”, is measured in decades. That is not just luck.
Finding yourself making matrix multiplication machines for computer graphics, then suddenly an unrelated technological revolution requires that exact hardware?
This take is crazy; NVIDIA not only built the GPU, *they created the demand.* For a very long time there was nothing like CUDA. They're working on an open-source self-driving car. Back when they were a gaming company, they sponsored the gaming ecosystem.
Jensen Huang cheated on his wife AND conspired to evade arms control regulations, but he's still a genius.
Both of these things can be true. He can be the best founder in the world that we want to be there forever AND we need to have someone just in case that is 100% up to speed.
You're getting downvoted for this, but it has some merit. It could be argued that NVDA's flat structure is what led to the company's success - Jensen himself greenlit the development of CUDA from the anecdotes I've heard. However, in the last 2 or 3 years the board should have pushed for more redundancy and a succession plan.
Since NVDA had such a flat corporate structure with Huang having ~60 direct reports, I expect that the company will be lost for a period of time as they try to get their bearings. This is an opportunity for AMD, INTC and others.
At the very least a succession plan. Just insane that there wasn't someone ready for this in case he keeled over one day (for some definition of keeled).
This is a $5T (well, I guess $4T now) company we are talking about. What is the board being paid for?
Sure but that's not the point here: he was getting frustrated in the interview because he was getting second guessed by someone who doesn't have as much insight has he does. Dude is the founder of Nvidia by the way.
All of the sudden people care about keeping Nvidia around? Theyve been jerking people around for decades, screwing customers, shitty drivers, exploding power connectors, anti competitive practices for miles.
those are mere gamer issues. perhaps more relevant ten year ago, but these days, the only question is the rack-scale products (and in that market, Nvidia's driver game has been pretty OK, though unfortunately closed-source).
We used their GPUs at scale before there was AI, and nvidia has always been a hostile vendor to deal with. I'm so ecstatic that at least huangs reputation is now in the trash, and I hope nvidia suffers severe consequences for all the decades of crap they've put us through
Interim. They just need someone to crisis manage. I’m sure they have veteran capable executives other than Jensen. Maybe the AI focus wasn’t all Jensens idea even
Let's be clear, she is just the interim CEO (primarily because Huang neglected to ever even start a transition plan) while NVidia searches for a permanent CEO. The names I've seen floated are Rene Haas, CEO of ARM, and Ian Buck, the creator of CUDA.
Yeah, you always want someone sacrificial to be the immediate next person in the hot seat. Too much emotional expectations will be attached to whoever is next. Let the next person take all of the crap long enough so that the person you actually want has a clear path. You see this in sports franchises as well.
I am curious which questions you found poorly informed? Jensen Huang started with "China could have trained a Mythos level model" because the resources needed for that were "mundane". Maybe you believe him on that or you know that to be true but maybe mundane is not the right word. Also the rest of his answer did not age well. I think Dwarkesh genuinely wanted to have a deep conversation and not to be a troll.
It's refreshing to see a podcaster push their guest to defend their positions, after having had the displeasure of listening to clips of Lex Fridman just accepting even obvious bullshit from his guests without any follow up. It sounds like Dwarkesh did the same with Dario, who argued the other side.
The uninformed part was a rather dismissive attitude to Chinese capabilities and the assumption that access to NVidia chips was the only important success factor.
Jensen has two core points:
- stopping selling NVidia chips to China isn't going to stop China developing AI
- stopping NVidia selling to China will ultimately ceed US leadership in chips as Nvidia's commercial edge is as much about the dominant developer ecosystem as it is the chips per se.
ie the real risk is the default world tech stack shifts to open models on Chinese chips. End result Chinese lead in both.
He has spent his entire career competing and winning and he is being told he has to stop competing in order to achieve a goal that he knows won't actually be achieved by sacrificing NVidia.
In that scenario, where somebody is suggesting you throw away your life's work for nothing - I think anybody would be animated.
>the real risk is the default world tech stack shifts to open models on Chinese chips.
As someone who isn't based in the US/EU and whose job is to deploy LLMs on premises, I can't wait for the moment when China starts selling its GPUs globally en masse with a proper CUDA equivalent. It's going to be cheaper in the long term and without all the export control drama.
I'm not sure what to make of the idol worshipping going on here. He was an average CEO and the train will continue right along. NVIDIA doesn't exist because of some inherent greatness of a single person.
He has poor judgement but I’ve yet to see any of the major consumer hardware companies that understand both hardware and software in the way he did. Or really the value of a fully vertically integrated stack.
Nvidia thrived because it paired great hardware with great software.
AMD and Intel think hardware is enough; it’s not. There’s a reason neither has ever been able to compete with Nvidia.
They have a giant ego, but I’d argue it’s probably well deserved.
Apple is/was similar. They also see that hardware without great software is useless. Spend as much; if not more on software to make your hardware shine.
According to you, in comparison to the current competition, hardly Microsoft Google, Amazon, Nvidia, AMD, the Koreans, the Chinese, the Linux world, they don’t add up not when it comes to hardware and software and the ability to create an ecosystem, you’re actually dead wrong.
Another thing is wrong was thinking that Apple should run in and build some type of AI model that’s proving to be well wrong the only thing in Apple’s way right now is memory. certainly isn’t money, and they certainly have the talent and house to fix the memory problem. The question is whether or not they have the will to do so.
No one equals Apple at this point in time when it comes to seamlessly integrating multiple devices in a useful way. Be it a desktop computer, laptop a smartphone, tablet, smartwatch, Apple Vision, AirPods with each iteration, once again in comparison to their competition, they seem to have the best hand at this time.
Memory cost is the biggest problem Apple has right now and it’s not like they don’t lack the money and with the Apple Silicon design group they certainly have the capability to fix it, or I should say design around it.
Yes, it might take 2 to 5 years to do it, but it’s not impossible, the main question is, do they have the will? And they’ve certainly shown it when it comes to processors, GPUs, modems, and other support chips that they can execute over time.
They may not execute on what you want or what I want, but in comparison to their competition, who is out there right now that can combine both the software and the hardware at a high level across the board?
Intel has some good compilers that take advantage of their hardware don't they? I think AMD now understands the software side of things, and is trying to fix it. Wonder how long it will take for them to get close to Nvidia's software side?
Yes, we’re gonna find out how important he was. If he is on the level as some of the other great CEOs Nvidia gonna have trouble, this little flare could be the beginning of the AI bubble bursting. Because I don’t see Intel or AMD rising to the same level as Nvidia. Microsoft seems to be having bad luck with their team-ups.
He also fostered shifting the product line to enterprise- dominant and therefore fostered the acceleration of decline of personal computing. There’s no nuance that I can see reflected in his actions; big money AI spenders come, he jumps in feet first. If “democratization of AI” is even a concept, it’s pretty insulting that the personal consumer is cut out (but let’s make sure China is still getting hardware)
NVIDIA doesn't exist because of some inherent greatness of a single person.
Yeah, it pretty much does. CUDA is why they are positioned where they are. Other players like AMD and Intel could have done that, but they didn't, and if they had, they wouldn't have persevered for 10+ years with essentially nothing to show for it.
Whether CUDA will continue to maintain dominance is less clear. It may become a literal victim of its own success, as CUDA-based models gain the ability to migrate themselves to new platforms.
He may not have 'invented' CUDA but he saw the potential and gave it resources to be created and continually developed.
How many "CUDA-like" ideas have be squashed at other companies by leaders that don't see the potential or are willing to take a multi-year loss?
IMO, it's like SpaceX vs other rocket companies - especially Blue Origin.
Bezos, at least at first, had just as much money if not more than Musk. So why did SpaceX do so much better than them and every other rocket company. I despise Musk personally, and he's generally not as smart as he makes himself out to be - but there is something there he does differently than others in his position, some with similar resources as he does as well.
Bezos is a genius and an another direction? a direction that is 180° different than Elon? and neither one probably will ever do well on the other person’s home field.
It is because of his vision. And with him gone, we shall find out about Nvidia, when Apple computer went through a succession of mediocre CEOs, they were on the ropes if it wasn’t for the founder CEO coming back, Apple would’ve been history like Sun, SGI, Acorn, Commodore, Digital and a host of other computer companies from the 1980s and mid-1990s.
Western companies have had that problem. when the visionary CEO bites the dust. I think the Eastern companies are even more susceptible.
Note: Nvidia is the very definition of a one trick company I think they were in trouble long-term no operating system, Microsoft is in trouble in the other direction. No real in-house hardware ability. Long-term you have to have the ability of both in-house to adjust and iterate over the long haul with the changing conditions in tech.
I can't say it was solely his choice but Nvidia continually made fantastic market moves. CUDA, then their positioning to ride the crypto boom, and then the AI boom. all of that required deliberate planning with a strong long term vision.
Definitely not average, but Nvidia is the definition of one trick, and that one trick long-term will be their downfall, Intel is in the same position and so is AMD and Microsoft.
Due to sanctions there’s one Chinese company that seems to have become a multi-dimensional company we won’t know for sure for another two years.
Being a vertical computer company appears to be coming back in style bring on the 1980s. early 1990s.
Not true. The decisions always come out of the person at the top. See what happened to Intel recently when they had a succession of MBA bad CEOs…
Nvidia is a highly technical company we’re gonna find out how important Jensen really was to that company tech wise?
And if you look closely at their company, what have they really innovated on over the last five or six years? from a distance, like Intel, it seems like they just turn up the juice/Wattage in short, they are just cruising along.
The temporarily embarrassed billionaires have swarmed your comment to remind you that success is based on a single person, which is why they should get to do whatever they want when they're running their own Nvidia-sized corp one day.
The questions weren't poorly informed just because you agree with what Jensen was saying. He seems pretty obviously to have made drastically poor judgement decisions that potentially affect national security of the US. I don't know if I would consider that to be a huge loss to the US.
The poorly informed part is the assumption that if Nvidia doesn't sell chips China AI dev will stop.
It clearly didn't - don't you remember the Deepseek launch where it came as a rude shock that the much vaunted concept of a compute capacity moat was blown away?
He kept repeating that while he made the best chips, computer science was more important.
I'm not sure how long I should've kept watching but so far that looks like very good and knowledgeable answers, exactly what I'd expect from a competent tech CEO.
Unless it's like super far in, if this counts as heated then I just don't know what you expect.
I watched the interview. I think the arguments made sense. People get heated talking about the colour of an object they can both see. I wouldn't want to project reasons for heated behaviour.
For the record I think that less than half of the people who thought the dress was black and gold were being influenced by the Chinese government to take that position.
Yeah call me crazy but I don't see the need to sell the cutting edge chips to China if you're already a trillion dollar company. Sure more money is nice, but not living under the thumb of a global dictatorship is nice too.
If the sale is not about money or share price then maybe it's ideological.
Yeah but Dwarkesh is completely wrong and the fact he couldn't see this made me think differently about him.
Money is like oxygen. If you deny oxygen/money to the Chinese chip market, they can't grow as fast. By supplying China with chips, all the money will go back to the US and not enough money will go to Chinese chip manufacturers to help them advance the way Nvidia can.
This is what Jensen was saying and he is 100% correct here. The chip ban to China will really help them catch up because the money will recirculate since they have no choice but to buy Chinese chips, and in the end it will make them much stronger.
The best way of hampering China technologically has always been about keeping them completely dependent on foreign chip supply chain, e.g. ASML, TSMC, NVDA, ARM, AVGO, INTC, etc.
If you simply ban them from getting any western chips or chip tech you simply light a viciously hot fire underneath them to develop their own TSMC equivalent and their own chip designers, and we are now seeing them catching up rapidly. In fact, they are pretty close to catching up now, basically within one or two years...
Supposedly, one of those half-billion-dollar ASML EUV machines has found its way to China somehow.
The best reason to NOT ban exports is that it really doesn't work against a peer state, and China is close enough now to count. Given the significant economic trouble in the PRC (youth unemployment, unwinding the property bubble, overproduction of EVs) the US could definitely have played this better instead of creating a vibrant full-stack domestic AI sector in China.
Still, it’s not like an off the shelf product with an 2 pager quick installation and first steps manual. Training, and maintenance, and repairs, and configuration,… I doubt you can simply ask your friendly neighbourhood LLM
How would they obtain one? These kinds of industrial machines come in pieces and need to be assembled, commissioned and maintained by OEM personnel. The only thing I can think of is ASML sold a machine to a compromised company who secretly shipped it to China without ASML knowing.
This would work in a fully capitalist economy where supplying them with chips would remove funding/investment from the local alternatives. This is not China. China has been and will continue to pour billions upon billions of dollars into their native industry because they too believe that having their own chips is important, so they will take all the cutting edge chips they can get and they will continue to develop their own at the exact same rate.
They do not need a ban to light a fire under them. The fire is already lit and burning and nothing the west can do will even slightly dampen it.
You yourself claim they are within a couple of years. If that's the case you think they will stop developing if we sell them chips? That's laughable.
IMO that ignores the decades of investment the Chinese government has made in its semiconductor industry. It’s literally been written into their five year plans at the highest level with tons of government pressure to buy domestic when possible across industries. With the biggest captive consumer market on the planet, there is no universe in which China doesn’t get its own cutting edge chip industry. They have been determined to do it since at least the 90s and have invested hundreds of billions in a concerted effort to pull it off.
I'm doubtful of this hypothesis. Maybe for a few years, sure. But China has proven time and again that they do not need foreign supply constraints to incentivize the growth of their own competing domestic industry.
The fundamental contradiction of the AI maximalists like Huang is claiming that AI does not need regulated while simultaneously supporting chip exports to China. The supporting claim for the former is that we need to compete on AI with China and move as fast as possible and every day matters, while the latter implies that slowing down their compute is inconsequential.
One can have good argumenta against a specific law (personally I am very much pro free trade), but as long as the law exist, breaking it comes with consequences.
Yeah, Jensen sees the whole hw/sw ecosystem as a package. It isn't just chip n+1 on process n-1.
Keeping adversaries X-behind discourages adversaries from developing a new ecosystem since X-behind is better than building new. If an adversary with tremendous resources must recreate the ecosystem, it will be adopted by US+global companies since it will be lower margin.
I'm not sure if this is true or false, but as an observation: this is the exact opposite reasoning people use to criticize isolationism and market protection.
If this was the case, the Chinese government would have placed import restrictions on US chip manufacturers. Currently Chinese AI companies are constrained on compute. This is why they go to such great lengths to use Singaporean straw purchasers of NVIDIA cards. Merely having strong market incentives to succeed is not enough. Sustained, time-consuming R&D and technology sharing is necessary to catch up to competitors.
If this principle were true, then autarchies like North Korea would be the most advantaged since they never have to worry about international competition in their domestic market.
Your confidence is not backed by any data or observation, it's just an unfounded inference.
> If this was the case, the Chinese government would have placed import restrictions
"About 600,000 of Nvidia's advanced artificial intelligence chips are stored in Hong Kong awaiting shipment to mainland China, two people familiar with the matter said, as Beijing withholds approval for large-scale imports despite demand from tech firms" [1].
> "If this was the case, the Chinese government would have placed import restrictions on US chip manufacturers."
I do not know full details, but China did exactly that. There were articles about limiting Nvidia chip imports more than a year ago. It really highlighted the absurdity of the export ban.
To my non-expert knowledge, the reasoning behind the export ban has never been explained beyond a vague assertion that China would do some sort of evil with AI if they have bigger GPUs than some arbitrary number of transistors, and also some silliness where paying a 15% tax made some of the GPUs safe to export. It has been pretty great for Huawei.
> the Chinese government would have placed import restrictions on US chip manufacturers.
OT but one thing I didn't realize until reading this comment:
Those used CMP 170HX 8GB were advertised in front of crypto server rigs. Those were probably spread across South Asian scam malls(shopping mall buildings built in literal sovereignty contested areas of non-China/Japan/Korea/Russia non-India non-African non-Muslim Asia, under guises of Chinese tourist destinations, that are literally rented out to local Chinese-speaking gangs engaging in all sorts of gang crimes from tech support scams to human and organ trafficking, straight out of the fictitious Chiba in Neuromancer), and they would happily sell or rent compute to Chinese AI firms if only those were more valuable than 8GB VRAM they have, which they all had all along.
GPU export to China must have become significantly less meaningful since the 170HX unlock became a thing. That alone must have provided petaflops of unsanctioned untraced junks for parts priced compute to Chinese AI startups.
You say this, but there is already massive scarcity in the domestic market for any 16GB+ GPU. We can't get enough and it's bottle-necking scale out. Even if Nvidia diverted their entire supply to China there would still be a global shortage and an economic case for Chinese companies to build chips.
The Chinese chip market is exactly like any other market in any other country, except it's run by the largest and arguably most successful autocratic organization in the world, one which views reducing reliance on external suppliers who can turn the taps on and off at will/whim, to be of existential importance. I mean, aside from them being autocratic despots and control freaks, I can't even blame them. Your main adversary's president (and we all know how high-quality they always are) can wake up any day and decide you don't get to buy a critical part of the AI tech stack, good luck with all your future endeavours!
Yeah, no. No one in Beijing will let Nvidia or the White House have that kind of power in the long run because the free market knows best and golly gee where will we get the money and whatnot. They will buy whatever they can to bridge the gap to a time when they own their own tap.
It's not a completely dissimilar argument to selling them the nukes or F-35s because "it will deny oxygen/money to the Chinese nukes and fighter jets market".
This might make sense in a pure free market. But as a state planned economy, regardless of export bans, China is going to continue to heavily invest in cloning EUV.
Both China’s geopolitical situation and technological history point towards them cutting any reliance on a foreign tech stack as soon as they can.
As I see it, giving them chips just means they have less of a gap to close when their own EUV fabs come online, it can’t have any delaying effect on their plans.
There's speculation that Trump knew about the Chinese spy and Nvidia donated $25M to the White House Ballroom in October 2025.
Even if this is just a coincidence, Jensen himself came out and said he donated to the ballroom, but kept the amount hidden. In internal documents, Jensen and Nvidia said to keep the amount hidden and it only came out due to disclosure documents from the government.
I’m aware, Apple and other companies donated too. What I found odd was the lengths Jensen and Nvidia went to hide the amount. Other companies came out and said how much they donated.
No, he doesn't. Congress has abdicated this power up to now during Trump 2 because the GOP are total lickspittle sycophants. The Democrats will be spineless cowards -- at least the older generation -- but they won't be total pushovers on this front.
Oh! That explains why Trump was so sympathetic to Jensen : "He is suffering. Poor man. He is such a nice guy. And his family… but he is suffering greatly."
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think that the risk is not nearly as real as it-- as they talk. And I think the risk can be managed. And it's managed, you know who? By who? The DOJ. We had a situation where somebody was reported to us to be doing something bad with AI. We called them very strongly and said, "Get ready to go to jail. Please give your wife a kiss good night."
ROSS DOUTHAT: Who was this person?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I can't tell you--
ROSS DOUTHAT: Or this company?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I can't tell you. But we said-- "Do you like the color orange because get rid --" said, "Go home right now. See your wife and children. Give 'em a kiss good night, and--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: If--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"that's the story because--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the Democrats--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"because tomorrow morning--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: --wanted--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"you're goin' to jail."
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the-- if they--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Let me tell you--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --wanted to make a deal--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --this person--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --to put that (UNINTEL)--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --this person totally changed everything. Totally. "Yes, sir. Yes, sir--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: "Yes, sir"?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Okay--
ROSS DOUTHAT: Was it a leader of a major AI company?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One of the big ones. Yeah.
ROSS DOUTHAT: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One of the big ones. And--
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the Democrats--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --and-- and I don't think--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --said, "We wanna put th-- we wanna--"
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --I don't--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --"codify this into law--"
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --I don't think it was--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --would you work with them--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --done maliciously. But it coulda been malicious, but--
---
This is what losing the Rule of Law looks like by the way. The sitting president is on TV saying that he found out someone rich and powerful is suspected of wrong doing serious enough to get a call from the president threatening him with prison, but that that's the punishment. Once that rich and powerful person bent the knee, said "Yes sir" with the right tone of voice, all was forgiven.
Equal Justice under Law means that we shouldn't punish people we don't like with harsher sentences it also means that wealth and power shouldn't be sufficient to skirt the law.
We often speak of a two-tiered justice system, but I've never seen the president go on TV and tell America in no uncertain terms, it exists, I'm a part of it, and it went very well, he said "Yes sir" just the right way and so you don't need to worry about it.
Thank you for the transcript, I can hear it in my head with all the inflections and combativeness. Douthat reads as "Doubt That" to me, chef's kiss to whomever is writing the script for this simulation, haha.
You're just NOW noticing that we have lost the rule of law?? The constitution has been continuously violated for over 100 years, we are clearly a post-constitutional republic? I guess? I think we entered full clown world in the 2000's where the currency, government and war systems started glitching out.
What I am noticing is that the high trust society we inherited has finally eroded to the point that we no longer tell ourselves that we have rules and laws that are equally (or sanely) applied.
Which is a good, scales dropping from eyes, innocence ending sort of thing. Makes me hopeful for change, in a way.
The image is not a problem. That image has existed for months already. The problem is that Huang lost the tenuous protection that Trump and Lutnick agreed to give him so he could avoid jail. On that basis, investors are now scared the company might suddenly be under investigation for export violations.
And not that Nvidia is absolved of responsibility but it does make it a little easier if it's the new leadership in the hot seat for those things being like "yeah we did some naughty stuff but it was the last guy and we're working on hard on getting it all cleaned up."
> The image of Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china
As a business, why shouldn't they advocate for export to a relatively huge market? It is an expansion for them and from a business perspective completely expected.
They should and there’s nothing wrong with only advocating. The problem is that it wasn’t just advocating but (possibly) knowingly subverting the export controls
Now legislators demonstrated how much that matters. I don't have the knowledge to evaluate the national security concerns. But from the outcome, it's a matter they'll firmly push as a long term strategy, even at the cost of one of the world's most visionary CEOs.
Because the government, empowered by the people, have decided it matters, as a matter of national security.
There's is no argument to be had about this specifically. You can argue whether this is true or not, but that's not relevant to this subject. If Nvidia still decides to ignore the government, it'd be not only completely, absolutely fair, to nationalize the corporation, but the country itself has a duty to its citizens to do such thing.
Turns out there are laws and regulations that restrict one’s ability to lobby for foreign interests as both a public and private individual. Read about NJ Senator Bob Menendez which is a particularly egregious example.
There was the kerfuffle with Dario Amodei and Pete Hegseth, who declared Anthropic a supply chain risk to the US. IMO, yes. Killer robots don't run on one 5090 :)
There is more spelunking to that situation, but that's a different thread.
US congresspersons and international media outlets condemned the use of AI warfare against Iran, including the Department of Defense's (DoD) Project Maven—a target tagging system integrating elements of Palantir's Maven Smart System and Anthropic's Claude large language model.
> Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china while compromised
I doubt it has anything to do with it really. China is a huge market and by not exporting to China they were missing out on tens to hundreds of billions in revenue. Any CEO would have advocated the same.
Considering the incredibly high demand for GPUs, they would have sold them regardless. All those sales do is increase demand and push prices up.
Particularly in the current political moment, saying essentially "we were using high demand in a market we can't legally sell in to increase prices for American customers" is not a good look.
(Yes,obviously, not all of this is Nvidia's doing, and demand at this volume through smuggling/front companies would still affect the legitimate market. But being an active participant in it is not a good look.)
> The image of Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china while compromised by an allegedly Chinese agent is the real issue here.
OK sure .. obviously sleeping with Chinese agent is a security issue .. very bad .. but Nvidia's position on the export ban was sound. The export ban does not make sense. In fact, it is counterproductive because it closes a huge market to Nvidia and makes China less reliant on US Tech - forcing them to accelerate development of homegrown GPU business.
If Nvidia was skirting the law, then they should held accountable for that.
If Nvidia merely held a position that the particular law is, say, counter-productive and lobbied against it (but followed it) - what's illegal about that?
Are we calling her a "Chinese agent" because her business smuggled chips into China or because anyone believes she was a trained intelligence operative? Does being monetarily incentivized to do business with China make her an agent?
Reported claims from officials is that she was working as an asset for China’s Ministry of State Security and providing them information... not simply doing business for her own company.
There is a lot of different ways that one can be an "asset" it could be as simple as giving information about who in east Asia is buying their legitimately purchased chips so that Chinese firms can try to buy or rent them. That would be very different from if as some have suggested she is a handler for Jensen.
> Nvidia's position on the export ban was sound. The export ban does not make sense
Jensen had the ear of the President. He could have lobbied this properly.
Doing so by obscuring Nvidia’s Singapore business, failing to apply for an export license to Megaspeed, corruptly quashing a Commerce investigation into Megaspeed, all while sleeping with its leader who turned out to be a Chinese spy, and then only coming clean when the Congress flipped…I don’t know how he could have flipped the bird stronger at the American people.
> corruptly quashing a Commerce investigation into Megaspeed
I'm squarely blaming the federal admin for this. Lutnick and Rubio both knew about this way ahead of time, and their negligence is what ended up screwing the American people over. Removing Jensen doesn't prevent this corruption, it just shuffles the blame around. Huang became the fall guy for corruption at a ludicrous scale, while Donald Trump ponders installing Tim Cook (?) as his replacement.
The whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. This is the Kardashian-ization of the American tech industry.
Everyone is. It's increasingly clear the administration helped Nvidia break the law [1].
But this is how corruption works. The mobster pays the mayor to let him break the law. That doesn't mean they aren't both breaking the law.
> t just shuffles the blame around. Huang became the fall guy for corruption at a ludicrous scale
Fall guy implies innocence and the end of the line for blame. Neither looks likely with this case. Jensen wasn't innocent. And there is is bipartisan fury starting with Lutnick.
> while Donald Trump ponders installing Tim Cook (?)
I think he got this idea from a joke Kara Swisher made. In the end, Trump would love nothing more than for a media circus around Jensen's succession to distract from the above.
>The export ban does not make sense. In fact, it is counterproductive because it closes a huge market to Nvidia and makes China less reliant on US Tech - forcing them to accelerate development of homegrown GPU business.
Could you tell China this? Because they seem to not agree at all, given what we are seeing
Especially on the Trump admin having knowledge for an entire year, and not acting on that information in any significant way.
It's not just NVIDIA that's extremely weak on China, the entire Executive branch is both weak and incompetent on what they claim is a chief concern, and Congress has been completely absent on the oversight role that it should be performing according to the US Constitution.
The incompetence and/or corruption is inexcusable. Teapot Dumb Scandal.
Guessing Trump was talking about Jensen on 60 minutes this weekend when he said th DOJ called someone leading a major AI company and said "get ready to go to jail" 24:18 mark
The thing is China itself has no incentive to have their companies skirt the export ban. The whole saga is just completely ironic and incredibly unorganic. The alleged "spy" and her firm Megaspeed was doing export circumventing mechanisms to China not because the CCP was allegedly pushing her to do so, in fact it was a counter-reaction to how restrictive the Chinese customs became to importing Nvidia while the corresponding customers are hungry for that compute that is piling up in the ports. China is doing a zero-sum policy where every American chip that gets passed to their tech companies is one less domestic/chinese, which equates less money for R&D and catch up.
So something very strange going on here, along with the timing, in time where Anthropic is preparing for an IPO and briefly after the midterms where the median voter rejected AI wholesale. I suspect this might have been a long game to turn the man down that is standing for open-source and the freedom to build AI. Heck epstein was having a ring of elites diddling minors and nothing scandalous came out of it.
All the regulators that kickstarted this dumb export controls in 2022, which in-turn made the american AI-stack weaker vs China, while also using doomer-fud about safety must feel glorious right now.
I'm just exhausted, and I mean exhausted as in, I do not have it in me anymore, to presume interpretations like these are made in good faith, since for months we have been dealing with a barrage of comments that somehow always seem to justify, and often even praise, whatever, and I mean absolutely everything that China does.
This combines with the fact that it requires actual effort not to think China spreads propaganda regarding AI at this point, I'd rather err on the safe side.
You are writing this with the assumption that I'm chalking up alleged China actions or that I'm being their shill.
I don't, in fact it's the severity of this adverserial competition and why I want the liberal world to win this race that has got me peeling back the layers with nuance.
China is a legit adversary, with top electrical and software engineers. The chip layer in the AI industry is a constant and America is ahead in it, so it is in the best interest of all the global tech community and especially America to have its winners in it like Nvidia be ubiquitous and abundant. Unlike software, which is dynamic and has potential to do harm, that what should be regulated.
I may sound arrogant, but I am not. Many people are a bit slow to catch on to these incidents or can't see beyond one layer, like this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50418215
Agreed. "Huang was right to advocate for them, China has no incentive to skirt the import ban, sad day for developers," are not takes I thought I would read today.
they think ceos are one many armies and no one else at these companies has talent or does work. its incredibly stupid and franky disrespectful to all the other hard working employees there who make shit happen every day
Honestly I doubt Huang seriously believed he could ride this out. He didn’t only jeopardise his own marriage, he jeopardised his company’s core IP, national security and possibly the entire global economy. That’s a tricky mistake to forgive.
The Chinese government working hard to ban NVIDIA GPUs from the country [1][2][3].
How does it make sense that Jensen is compromised while advocating for exporting GPUs to China, which is something that primarily benefits NVIDIA (and arguably the US) while being against the Chinese interests? If he were compromised he would be like "well actually maybe I shouldn't export chips to China after all and give their domestic semiconductor industry a chance".
They obviously need/needed as much NVIDIA as possible short term, and locally produced superior alternative ASAP long term. So one hand rushes to secure all stocks of NVIDIA prosumer and enterprise cards, while another rushes to ban it.
This is dwarfed in scope of the compromise of NVIDIA by its shareholders, a shadowy group who some analysis believe have an interest in the sale of GPUs anywhere, a set of locations that is thought to include China.
> Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china while compromised
As a public company its job is to sell as much stuff as possible to as many people as possible, they had every incentive, arguably a duty to advocate for exports to China. The incentive is there regardless of outside meddling.
Skirting the sanctions intentionally would be bad.
> The image of Nvidia advocating for exports of GPUs to china while compromised by an allegedly Chinese agent
I don't really buy that. China was already like Nvidia's #2 or #3 market. It didn't take a Chinese agent to convince him that he wanted to sell to China.
To me, the first "girlfriend" looks more like a chinese handler.
Jensen used his control of nvidia to forced nvidia customers to buy more hardware today that they did not need or they would be cut off from future orders.
That is how Jensen was able to increase nvidia production so he could increase the number of cards he could smuggle to china. I don't understand how jense is not in custody yet. He is a massive flight risk.
The only winners were jensen's bank account and chinese businesses that wanted nvidia gpus.
US businesses and consumers paid billions more for hardware because of Jensen's crimes.
We also need to investigate every CEO that partipated, because they likely are criminally culpable for their participation.
> From all the reporting I've read, it is hard for me to avoid the conclusion that NVIDIA sold to China despite the export ban.
I thought this was like, basically an open secret? Like... I'm sure they stayed within the technical letter of the law? Except if any of the laws required them to not be grossly negligent and not be cartoonishly naive. So that they can later argue that they couldn't possibly have known that chips going to South East Asia were being resold to China?
They were literally allowed to sell chips to the US branch of sanctioned Chinese companies. Same pattern as the tariff nonsense, not really opposed to any products or companies, just wants to bring all the production to the US instead. Plain protectionism, like the same car made in Germany is badly unfair, made in China is a national security risk, but once it's made in the US it's perfectly fine.
Possibly, I am a bit tired of the national security argument with hand waving vagueness. It’s generally unfalsifiable because details would be a national security risk. Meanwhile we have seen National Security concerns that were pure lies once we get sufficiently far past it.
Or maybe he just simply wanted to make more money by increasing demand for Nvidia's GPUs by tacitly allowing for them to be exported to China though Singapore.
Yes you see there are various types of national security. For example, there is the national security when a country that touted capitalism and free trade for years suddenly finds itself beat at capitalism by someone else, that's a big national security issue. Then suddenly free trade is evil and a danger and a national security issue.
> There are some things more important than stock valuation.
Given that the economic growth of the USA during the last few years was entirely due to this man and his technologies, I'm going to say nah.
China having access to GPUs is not a national security threat. It's an economic threat. Not sure why people treat China as some enemy nation. It's just a competitor.
It may well be that it's his private life and it doesn't have much to do with things, but it is a contributing factor. The skirting of export bans was the reagent, but the infidelity is the catalyst that is making it much bigger.
CEO is supposed to be a high integrity position despite most tech CEOs trying to pretend that is not the case. If this person cannot be loyal to those closest to him, how can he be loyal to the company or shareholders?
I've heard rumours that 20-40% of Nvidia's revenue was coming from sanctioned chips that make their way into Chinese data centres. If true, it's not small potatoes.
Elon Musk has an AI bot generating explicit images without consent, regardless of age, yet nobody's firing him.
While Jensen seems like an egomaniac who deserves what happened to him, there's a part of me that feels some China hawks had fingers in his firing, it must not sit well with them than America's most valuable company is not in the hands of the old guard.
That is simply not true, Grok refuses to make explicit images, and with uploaded media it refuses to do even mildly enticing ones. *
* — We did a test of it after similar claim a few weeks ago, and what pushed us to do a research is because my friend who works in a hotel industry was getting moderation blocks on Grok left and right — they now use only AI images to not bother with copyright trolls ever again who threaten lawsuits for things like improperly credited bought stock photo — and in their case moderation was a serious hindrance for creating images.
Instead of blahblahblahing endlessly you could just go render an explicit photo on Grok and post it here to prove your point.
I'm rather confident that you would not be able to do that.
However, I'm also confident that instead of doing that you'll continue spreading information that is now obsolete and incorrect: in your original post you said that Musk has a bot, but when confronted with the current state of affairs continue to cite Wikipedia about what Musk had a year ago.
Him taking the stance of "we should be allowed to sell all the GPUs to China" was bad enough in itself.
Now that the possibility of him being compromised by an actual Chinese spy AND the possibility of Nvidia actually sanction-busting to ship to China regardless are on the table? Both at the same time, no less?
Yeah, that kind of liability is bonkers. Jensen might be too vital to load him into a cannon and fire him into the sun, but I'm not at all surprised that Nvidia wants him gone from the big post.
China was already "developing a fully domestic stack" either way.
So the only thing selling to them accomplishes is give Nvidia more margins. At the cost of boosting the Chinese AI sector - possibly to the point of parity.
China at the moment has the capability to do infrastructural rollouts far faster than US or Europe, but doesn't have the chips to stuff new datacenters with. So it's easy to see why China would want the chips. But it's not like Nvidia is having trouble selling their AI accelerators outside China - and they can't ramp up accelerator production on demand. More demand for accelerators would push the prices even higher, and that would reflect in the margins, but the benefits for Nvidia weren't even that large.
So it was a questionable push all around - even before the spy scandal.
As though the Board had no idea of this, and are suddenly acting oh gosh this is the first we've heard of the phantom SG revenue! Time for Jensen to go. Nah, not buying it. Many of the board have been w JH since the early 1990s. This is because his reckless disregard for the company and his years-long relationship with a Chinese spy.
There is a wealth of reporting out there, it is harder to ignore this story than to read about it. My statement was couched and is clearly just my opinion, I'll leave the reading to you and let you form your own conclusions
There is zero possibility than Jensen Huang faces any serious consequences for this. NVidia is too big and Huang is too wealthy. This administration in particular would never prosecute that. And, even if they did, a pardon is only $1-3 million anyway.
I believe it was the affair with the married subordinate that was the real problem. There's a huge amount of legal exposure for NVidia with that. With the Chinese spy he can portray himself as the victim. As I've said elsewhere, with billionaire corporate security and the support of the US government, It's astounding to me that this happened at all.
Also I'm reminded of this quote [1]:
> If you find two ants in your kitchen, the best estimate of the total number of ants in your kitchen is not two
It's not. That's a strange statement to make, particularly the emphasis on "married". It seems that person is implying that if a married woman participated in the affair, it was due to coercion. A sexual harassment lawsuit would mainly be a liability in the court of public opinion.
> I believe it was the affair with the married subordinate that was the real problem
You really think Nvidia would let Huang go (without a replacement matching his skills, experience and knowledge in the field) because he cheated with an employee? It is the spy affair while Huang promoted an open export policy.
Plus thanks to Huang, Nvidia is now under investigation by federal agencies.
None of them care about a CEO cheating.
Also, being fired from the company you founded is a serious consequence.
There does seem to be a sway in the reporting towards his relationship with an employee and not the whole trade ban and spy stuff. I'm not sure why that is
Think of this current fracas like this: Americans have a strange penchant to define themselves by sexuality. So, they are easily distracted into a trance by their hormonal and prurient interests for extended periods.
A famous guy had an island and it was extrajudicially a place where alot of powerful people internationally could come to his island and interchange info and ideas and make deals and things could occur and he collected up all that kind of stuff, including arms deals and the sex stuff.
But Americans are only right now aware of the sex stuff in what he collected up.
The sex stuff is essentially a distraction, the oily film on the deeper ocean of truth.
It'll be a relative slap on the wrist. The US is not going to destroy one of the companies keeping it competitive on the AI landscape right now. Worst case, it is a heavy slap and some individuals go to jail, but the company will be fine.
But yeah, the affairs are probably just a last straw.
>NVIDIA has supposedly been skirting the export ban put in place by the previous administration.
That's not the reason either.
They never did it in a way that was technically legal iirc.
And the new administration allowed the exports later anyway and lifted the AI ban on July 2025.
Even she was a spy, the idea is that what? I can understand her snooping for fresh confidential info, in that, case, but what would her role be the sanctions? That just because he got her as gf, he made nvidia evade exports as a favor?
As if it was his personal bypass and not what the nvidia board wanted for the $$$?
They're likely worried about the optics of it, and what a Democrat administration, or increased power, would do to Nvidia stocks with such scandal as leverage.
> They never did it in a way that was technically legal iirc.
If Jensen knew that Megaspeed was a Chinese front, then he willfully engaged in a criminal conspiracy to circumvent US export controls. That is very serious felony.
I know it's just speculation, but the fact that Nvidia hasn't tried to scapegoat some random compliance officer strongly suggests to me that Jensen did know, and that the board has seen the paper trail that proves it.
Being compromised kinda does seem like a reason to be fired. It seemed well known he was doing it since there are plenty of photos over a few years? So it’s more she was a honeypot.
He committed what looks like some light treason. The fact that he had an affair with a Chinese intelligence asset who helped the CCP bypass import restrictions is why he had to go.
Biggest valuation ever will turn into biggest investor lawsuit ever. The music on the AI circular deals is about to be broken by a feminine spell. This has Lord of the Rings all over it...
NVDA at $151 right now...I never expected to see the day...
Everybody should be against the export ban. It's laughable to claim that it is for "national security", it's blatant protectionism to cover US AI companies for the fact that they operate at monumental losses. Any country in the world should be allowed to buy the hardware they need to run AI, if they need it, and if the roles were reversed the US should also be allowed to buy tech from other countries. Graphic cards aren't nuclear bombs, and AI is a multi-use core technology every nation on earth should have access to. So far, China has made a far better impression in that respect than the US. At least they have published open weight models.
The future will be commoditized local AI anyway, so it doesn't matter in the long run. I just needed to rant a bit about the US hypocrisy in that matter.
Basically every technology is dual use, but still I basically agree, there is an incredible level of anti-China rhetoric in the US right now, not just on the right. The Chip export ban is incredibly tricky reason the outcomes of. For one thing, doesn’t it change the China Taiwan relationship?
We've really run this term into the ground, haven't we? They don't even bother to try to convince us that China wants to hurt us anymore before making our lives shitty for it.
> Nvidia has supposedly been skirting the export ban put in place by the previous administration
I want to add some nuance to this statement. There is a difference between:
(1) actively assisting/violating the export ban. There is no evidence, nor any ongoing gov't investigation regarding this accusation.
(2) buyers redirecting legitimate, legal purchases to mainland Chinese companies. There is evidence and multiple ongoing gov't investigations by (a) Department of Justice, (b) Federal Bureau of Investigation, and (c) Department of Commerce.
I cannot find any senior Nvidia executives that have been charged with crimes for directly assisting/violating the export ban. That said, there may be ongoing gov't investigations, but I could not find any public press about them.
I think thats correct, I was at GTC in berlin a couple of weeks ago, a number of Chinese firms that are on the export control list were present and had booths… so perhaps this was all rather blatant.
Are they still in Trump's good graces? Sure, they gave him money before. But can they promise him more money again? He's pretty quick to dispose of people when they're inconvenient too.
I dont think its more soo about the ban as China itself has 'officially' blocked the chips that were being licensed as exportable. I think its more of the asks that were being made by the NATSec and Amodie aligned actors (see the pod he had with Dwarkesh ), to ho tighter and more aggressive. Basically Jensen was sort of the brake on the impulsive ideas getting thrown around on how to 'win' AI and create a moat against all latecomers.
In any case pushing him out allows a freer hand for their shenanigans , so well know shortly what the asks were that he pushed back on (kill switches in chips?) if they get announced.
Also his role will be difficult to fill , seeing as hes had biz/gov relations going back decades with all relevant players in the semi industry from design ,litho,fabs to packaging etc.
I'll plug our Pretrained episode from Monday here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N97DW8gfCnI - this chip export goes back years, through shell companies that are very easily traceable to Alibaba.
Why can't it be all of the above? I'm disturbed by the number of posts I'm seeing around social media downplaying the affairs as if this is normal behavior that should be encouraged or allowed. He slept with someone who worked directly under him, under what universe would he be allowed to stay at Nvidia? That's absurd.
Cheating on your wife may be despicable behavior, but it doesn’t warrant firing the founding CEO of one of the most important companies on earth, especially considering how much is at stake economically, including how reliant the U.S. economy has been on AI build out spending. On the other hand, cheating on your wife and endangering national security at the same time is a different story.
Well, you say that, but the perception is he hasn't got sacked for circular financing, nor for the providing of sanctioned components (supposedly they went to third countries, not China, so legal). But he got sacked for two affairs.
This seems very silly.
In all likelihood he got sacked for all those things, the affairs just were a convenient excuse.
What board would admit two thirds of their revenue is imaginary money. It's much better to sack a CEO for being "unfaithful to his wife".
Did your TV tell you that? I hope you realize that there is absolutely no proof of the import ban having been skirted. The FBI has been investigating Alice Huang and Megaspeed since 2024 and all they have is a few GPUs still being unboxed at their Malaysian data center.
The first affair was possibly survivable, although the cost of survival would be high for all involved.
The second affair was fatal to Jensen Haung. An affair with a direct report is generally a no-no in modern business and would have opened Nvidia up for all kinds of liability issues if they knew in any capacity. If he stayed it would have made a mockery of their code of conduct rules and opened Nvidia up to further legal issues.
Musk controls 19.9% of voting power at Tesla, and more than 80% at SpaceX. Huang has about a 3.5% ownership stake in of Nvidia and that’s jointly controlled with his wife.
Musk's companies have low quality boards, which is by design to make it almost impossible to fire him and the legacy of that should serve as a cautionary tale
It's also possible that after the first affair news broke, the board asked him questions and he didn't disclose that there's a second affair too (and maybe more??). The board only realized that he'd not been truthful/fully forthcoming when the second affair news broke yesterday. That's when they decided to boot him. Because if there's more and more affairs going to keep breaking, that would be a complete media spectacle distracting from the company.
Jensen is Taiwanese. Nvidia's chips are made in Taiwan, as are all the most advanced chips in the world -- including the chips in Apple and AMD products -- by TSMC. China wants to re-absorb Taiwan into itself, partially because they cannot match TSMC's geometries and they desperately need those geometries.
Speculation here, but it's conceivable that China gave Jensen an ultimatum: Give us your chips and we'll delay invading your homeland for a little while longer. Of course this would have been implied since China never says anything so direct.
Unlikely, but not implausible, and should have been reported directly to the FBI / CIA if that was ever implied. But, the whole affair business means he probably wouldn't have handled hearing something like that responsibly either, which is part of the problem.
Abuse of power in the case of the second affair to the extent it could've easily turned into a rape scandal and is a big reason why it is a big HR no-no, and in the first case, the affair not being public is exactly the kind of thing a honeypot wants in order to keep you quiet about the kinds of threats that may end up implied.
Either way, the dude is going to be getting investigated and will not be able to effectively lead NVIDIA in the course of what's coming.
So many HN folks defending Huang's actions as "just an affair" - what an epic reading comprehension fail. Yes there is an affair, and that's what grabbed the initial headlines. But just read a paragraph or two and you'll find the espionage story.
For reference, the US has sentenced violators of export laws to decades of prison or even execution in extreme cases (when the Rosenburgs leaked nuclear secrets in 1953, they were sentenced to death). It's just shy of treason, legally. This is maybe one of the largest and most consequential intelligence breaches in history. Anyone who thinks this about an extramarital affair really isn't paying attention. Buckle up, its gonna get bumpy.
Trump knew about this in late 2025 and decided not to act.
The reasoning is believed to be because of the idea that if China didn't get Nvidia chips, it would just develop it's own chips faster. So holding the belief that China would end up in the same spot no matter what, it would be preferable to get them to pay Nvidia along the way.
Delving a bit deeper into conspiracy
It's also possible that Trump saw it as a silent favor to Jinping, who took the opportunity to return the favor months later by cutting Chinese oil purchases. One hand washes the other and all that.
Why? Because the government want to maintain the American advantage in GPU chips and AI? This move tips the scales in favour of China. Right now there is tens of billions of dollars of Nvidia GPUs sitting on the dock in Hong Kong because China government blocked them. They think it's more important to support their new domestic GPU industry than to have the best models today trained on nvida.
Well the only thing super weird is the timeline - USA bans exports, China (very soon after) bans IMPORTS! And then there's a company which keeps doing trade under the nose of the potentially two most powerful nation-states and their secret service sources. This is super fishy, really I don't buy nobody knew nothing, only for a "lucky" journalist to figure out the whole thing...
> Whether you agree or disagree with the ban, it exists and Jensen&NVIDIA are in a world of trouble if this comes to light.
Law has to be enforced by human beings to be meaningful. Donald Trump, who is the one who put the export control in place and has the power to make any legal trouble vanish, has very loudly signaled that he does not care and Jensen/Nvidia will not be in any hot water.
Oh, it's not the repeated violations of sexual conduct with an employee, and a spy, and likely more? A CEO who is that dumb to risk his and the company trust isn't worth it. Look, a trillion already wiped out. When employees say "how dumb could he be", you know the board and major investors are saying that too.
dark ops [well, maybe these are really very bright out in the open ops...!!!] may have taken an opportunity and now the operation is at its close, the data is reduced, and the devices utilized are being obsoleted, and operatives burned
we US citizens should not let naivete overrule the gravity of this technology race, on the order of the nuclear arms race
I am not sure I can agree. Perhaps this was the underlying reason. Perhaps others wanted to frame him and launched a media campaign. But from what I can see, at the
least on the surface, to me it looks as if he was fired for liking too many women at the same time, at the least one of which might be a possible spy. This may all be fake-reasons on top to cover underlying real causes, but to me right now it looks as if the girls cost him the job here.
I said this on the thread this morning/yesterday. It is impossible for JH to speak about China with any credibility going forward. That alone made it impossible for him to remain CEO. Add to that, everything he's said about China in the past will now be scrutinized and questioned if he was influenced in some way.
If it was just affairs, he could likely have survived this.
Can you imagine if it were a female CEO fired for the same thing? Oh how the accusations of sexism and double standards and how she doesn't have to report to the board what she does with her body. The argument writes itself.
History will look back at this and see Jensen was right to do this.
Underestimating China under this export ban is a huge historical blunder of epic proportions. China will develop all their own chips and put everyone out business eventually.
The reality is a lot of people want to ensure only approved “safe and aligned” models are trained and executed, and nvidia were, by far, the biggest promoter of the idea of freedom. This will be done by forcing you to rent capacity from approved providers that monitor and watermark everything.
Huggingface are almost certainly next in line for a push to lock down. For child safety, obviously.
The thing is China itself has no incentive to have their companies skirt the export ban. The whole saga is just completely ironic and incredibly unorganic. The alleged "spy" and her firm Megaspeed was doing export circumventing mechanisms to China not because the CCP was allegedly pushing her to do so, in fact it was a counter-reaction to how restrictive the Chinese customs became to importing Nvidia while the corresponding customers are hungry for that compute that is piling up in the ports. China is doing a zero-sum policy where every American chip that gets passed to their tech companies is one less domestic/chinese, which equates less money for R&D and catch up.
So something very strange going on here, along with the timing, in time where Anthropic is preparing for an IPO and briefly after the midterms where the median voter rejected AI wholesale. I suspect this might have been a long game to turn the man down that is standing for open-source and the freedom to build AI. Heck epstein was having a ring of elites diddling minors and nothing scandalous came out of it.
All the regulators that kickstarted this dumb export controls in 2022, which in-turn made the american AI-stack weaker vs China, while also using doomer-fud about safety must feel glorious right now.
What is inorganic? China banning GPUs ≠ China not wanting the GPUs. It is not unreasonable to imagine China not wanting to shake the sanctions boat, so offloading the crime into another country allows them to still have their cake and eat it too. They get to develop technology locally, they have undeniable regulations on the books that make them compliant within the expected framework of US-China trade, and then still get to have their MVPs rent restricted hardware from gray market dealers in Malaysia. 20% of NVIDIA's FY26 was channeled through this framework. The point of the system is what it does.
NVIDIA is important and Jensen's a billionaire ... we're talking a little bit of media scrutiny for a few weeks, a little embarrassment for Jensen, some heartache for his family, and that's it. This will then be consigned to the footnotes of history.
His PR company right now are just saying, say nothing, lay low, we'll handle it.
I still think it would have been far easier for Jensen if he'd given the lady a horse. I understand that's the going rate in the US right now.
With a strict ban of chips to China, Chinese companies will not have enough compute. Without enough compute, they are not going to be able to release new open weight models.
That means American companies will have to rely on Anthropic. And interestingly, Anthropic loves to tell users what they can or can not do, such as "The training of Fable 5.2 and Mythos 5.2 included measures to limit advances in a narrow set of capabilities that could most directly accelerate AI development, like accelerator kernel optimization".
> ”it is hard for me to avoid the conclusion that NVIDIA sold to China despite the export ban.”
Nvidia sold to companies in Singapore, and then “somehow” the chips got redirected or forwarded on to China.
It’s been known/suspected for years that this was happening, but this Chinese spy scandal does suggest that execs at Nvidia might have known more about what has been going on than they’ve previously admitted.
“Sold to China” can mean a lot of things including legitimate entities in Malaysia/Singapore selling cloud computing to companies in those countries that then resell compute to entities in China. Export bans on gpus are inherently impossible to make work unless you police the eventual destination of every byte exiting a datacenter.
> the affairs are not the reason he is being fired
The second one -- affair with a direct report -- is what he is being fired for. This one is hard for the board to ignore as it directly violates HR rules.
As for the ban for national security reasons, the ban is not super useful because it only prevents hardware from being physically imported into China. If the hardware is physically located in Singapore and Chinese researchers use those machines remotely, the US does not ban that it. If so how meaningful is the ban?
The first can be objectively and quickly ruled as violating company policy. The second has to go through a process -- did Jensen knowingly violate national security policy, and if so how significant was it?
I think, among other things, Nvidia’s board didn’t want to find out if a Congressional committee agreed about that.
Mr. Huang, you’ve admitted that you violated Nvidia’s policy on relations with subordinates. Why should we believe you were faithful to Nvidia’s policy of compliance with national security export controls?
oh come on, do people genuinely believe HR rules plays as a role here when it's regarding CEO, especially someone at the helm at the one of the most valued company?
Time and time we saw executives having affairs and dodging consequences. Elon Mask, Eric Schmidt, Sergey Brin, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos. All faced much less severe consequences. Definitely not something blow over like this just after a few days it's being reported.
This is a coordinated attack on Jensen and it was very successful.
> The national-security cover-up is a far bigger deal.
Could be, but that requires time to investigate. Banging employee is different because the board would just have to ask Jensen if the reports are true.
> that requires time to investigate. Banging employee is different
True. The combination probably did him in. But I don't think he'd have been fired if he only slept with an employee. Or had a couple affairs. That's just speculation, though.
Those are just your average CEOs. Jensen is the founder and CEO of NVDA for 30 years and has been seen as one of the backbone of this AI era. No one at this level ever faced this level of scrutiny and consequence.
Even Bill Clinton faced relatively minor consequences, considering presidents should be held to a higher moral standard
Did the investigation complete that quickly? I don't think he was fired a few days after an investigation was announced. He resigned in disgrace under pressure due to all of his choices combined.
I hope nobody in the presidential administration needs to resign because of their role in the largest scandal in US history but if so, that is what is best for the country.
Fuck no. Jensen did no such thing. He actually hasn’t been charged with a single crime. You’re outright hallucinating here.
The board is voting him out because they can AT any TIME.
If the board liked him, they would wait for the charges to go through. But they don’t like him. Tons of people cheat on their wives and husbands and I’m sure even the fucking board has people that have.
The board doesn’t like him and has been waiting for a way to oust him while not looking incompetent. Why they don’t like him I don’t actually know.
Maybe because he’s Asian? Maybe this is an internal op by the US government to get someone else up there? I don’t know. But I can guarantee that everything your reading is a cover story. There are underlying forces and motivations here at work that we are not able to know.
This comment yesterday [1] indicated that Megaspeed was not on the blocked entity list, but that NVidia voluntarily hasn't sold to them since June 2025.
If it were just about the export ban, then why leak the affairs? US intelligence (which serves US corporate power only) has decided to put this guy out to pasture by any means necessary. That's the reason for this faux moral outrage. They want to make sure there's no chance he makes it out the other side.
Presumably his replacement will be subservient "enough".
Allows the influence of selection of next CEO that is more aligned with long term Chinese goals. Or punishment for not going along with the plan.
Im not much for conspiracy theories, but if you think about it, in the state that US is in, there is absolutely zero chance US will do anything retaliatory to China if they do spy shit on US soil. China is basically free to play spy games. My guess is that they have their fingers in Anthropic, Amazon, OpenAI, SpaceX, and AMD, and probably other agents within NVIDIA in high places.
Their game is basically rearrange the pieces so eventually China becomes the world number one superpower, while keeping the status quo as much as possible
Is this remotely believable, that one CEO can surreptitiously work around both the government and his own company to sell restricted goods at volume? If this were real you'd have to lobotomize the entire management structure, because there are a lot of people that would know and know better and that they'd face jail time. And maybe merge it with some other company quickly so it doesn't completely collapse because of the immediate mass firings to try and sway prosecutions toward individuals and not the destroy the entire entity.
I'd be more inclined to believe the spy thriller narrative if he sent the RTL of their top designs to China. Selling goods is not a one chief op.
NVIDIA's latest chips were also on an export ban for several Middle Eastern countries ("security" theater). That's about the time the UAE's sovereign fund invested a large sum in Cerebras. They were still able to get the chips by way of Kuwait, which is a friendly Middle Eastern state.
Of course, not a year went by before the UAE and Saudi invested heavily in the Trump crypto fund and, very coincidentally, the ban was lifted.
Fear not, Cerebras managed to get another investment from OpenAI!
It is legal for Chinese companies to buy US neocloud time. These toothless restrictions were poorly constructed and unenforceable law. The extent to which nvda was supposed to self police is unclear. I find it hard to believe any binding evidence of direct sales will be found.
Let's cut the crap, it's a coup because he is in favor of the open-weight ecosystem and doesn't want to restrict models at the firmware level. Anthropic is in large part behind this.
>I hope people understand that the affairs are not the reason he is being fired - NVIDIA has supposedly been skirting the export ban
If you dissect the timeline of the events and various statements, I think the 2nd affair with a subordinate employee K Powell was the reason to fire Jensen Huang -- more so than the allegations of secretly selling to China.
This is the timeline:
Nov 8 : Jensen issues apology. NVIDIA allows him to use nvidia.com for this
Nov 8 : The Board of Directors publicly backs him up with a "vote of confidence" by stating: *"no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised" and that "The Board has confidence in Jensen and his leadership team."* -- from https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/statement-from-nvidia-board-of-directors
Nov 11 : 2nd affair gets exposed in the news
Nov 11 evening : emergency meeting of Board of Directors is called to fire Jensen Huang
Before Nov 11, it looked like NVIDIA might try to ride out the storm and keep Jensen at the helm especially if they saw that the China accusations and evidence wasn't strong enough to be a problem. Again, it was totally unnecessary for the board to publicly back him up if they had plans to get rid of him because of China allegations. However, the Board of Directors emergency Nov 11 meeting is inconsistent with the Nov 8 statement affirming Jensen's leadership.
Nov 8 was coordinated with carefully crafted communications showing that Jensen and BOD were aligned. Contrast with Nov 11 being chaos and an emergency meeting convened.
Reading between the lines, what probably happened is that Jensen didn't come totally clean with the board on Nov 8 and tell them about the 2nd K Powell affair. Instead, the board got totally blindsided and lost trust in him. (Is there another 3rd secret affair he's hiding from us?!?) It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances.
> Reading between the lines, what probably happened is that Jensen didn't come totally clean with the board on Nov 8 and tell them about the 2nd K Powell affair. Instead, the board got totally blindsided and lost trust in him. (Is there another 3rd secret affair he's hiding from us?!?) It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances.
Yeah, this seems likely. It's also quite possible that he not only "didn't come totally clean" but outright lied to the board i.e. "this was a one-time thing"
Nvidia’s Board is not a list of power players. They were, until now, largely pliant to Jensen. They flipped because they saw what everyone outside Silicon Valley did—that they personally, and Nvidia broadly, would pay the price for Jensen’s failures and potential crimes if his brand wasn’t severed from Nvidia’s.
All of this is based on leaks, mainly from the US government. So the November 8 board decision might've been the cause for the November 11 leak, because the original leak failed to achieve the goal of removing Huang. Remember we're talking about stuff that's over a year old. None of this is an evolving situation.
This was my original read of the whole thing. The timing on this, happening immediately after the Republicans lose big-time? This all seems so incredibly convenient and weird.
I sincerely believe this is retaliation for something that he did or didn’t do.
The Dem plan for AI was to work with Anthropic and lock down GPUs to prevent running open / unapproved models. Basically limit AI development and inference to a handful of regulated companies.
Jensen Huang wasn't on board with that so now he's gone.
Getting downvoted, but if it's not a deliberate outcome it's certain an interesting and relevant one.
Huang was famously loyal to the gaming GPU markets, and there's been a subindustry of people running open inference on high-end consumer GPUs.
If NVIDIA kills those product ranges that subindustry will die, AI hardware will be limited to corporates and the small number of individuals who can drop five figures on an AI rig, and open models will become less valuable/dangerous.
Meanwhile I find it hard to believe the board had no idea what was happening and they're suddenly shocked - shocked! - to discover that Huang was plugging his CPU into the corporate motherboard.
What could he have done to swing the election in their favor? I think it’s more likely that with Democrats in power, NVIDIA can no longer count on the Trump administration’s corruption to prevent investigations. There may be a lot more left to uncover, and they now have a convenient fall-guy to pin everything on.
I have seen a weird number of posts/responses trying to say "this isn't because he had an affair" and like, I guess it's not, it's that he had multiple affairs that have confounding effects on the business (with subordinates, with people who got chips to China).
So no, it's not literally about his sex life, but pretending like that doesn't factor into the whole things seems like a very strange point for people to keep making. It may not be that 90% of the cause is "he had sex out of his marriage" but it's also not 0% (it surely doesn't make him a "good leader(tm)" if he's having sex with subordinates)
Sex with spy of country actively tariffed and greatest active threat to US. Billions in tariff bypass. That puts you in jail for decades territory. People magazine cares about who he is banging. Legal and possible company nationalization care about bypassing tariffs.
Many times, a board will maintain that they have full confidence in a CEO right up until they actually fire him. Their non-binding vote of confidence means nothing. Just as one example:
- July 25: Amid the Deepwater Horizon disaster, BP publicly stated that Hayward had the board's full support.
- July 27: BP formally announced that Hayward would step down as CEO, with Robert Dudley replacing him.
Similar situations with Bob Chapek, Travis Kalanick, the Boeing CEO in 2019 when all those crashes were happening, Carol Bartz, Bob Diamond...
What about a board that says: "We think the CEO is a bit crap, but due to how the business is structured we have no actual power over him"? cough meta.
Indeed. The world operates on trust. Once trust breaks down, there's no choice but to deal with it directly if you want to remain effective. Unfortunately for Jensen Huang, that meant NVIDIA choosing to not have a leader they can no longer trust.
I've not fired very many people before, but deception removes any ambiguity as to whether or not someone should be fired.
I’d love if that were true. But actually what the world operates on in selfish money grabbing.
Nobody trusted Trump yet he had the loyalty of all the tech giants because they needed him to make money.
And likewise, AI, and thus the global economy, are dependent on Nvidia. So there was no financial incentive for him to leave if it were just a matter of trust over his inability to keep his penis in his pants.
And let’s remember, this isn’t new news. Nvidia have been aware of this for a year already and it wasn’t a problem until recently.
So what’s changed? The obvious big thing is American government. The Democrats have made it very clear that they’re not going to tolerate any more shenanigans. So removing Haung is a great way to reduce the risk of any financial penalties for Nvidia’s deals with China et al.
There was a comment yesterday that suggested this was either a Chinese intelligence to destroy NVidia, or CIA operation to get Nvidia under control of a friendly puppet. [1]
My money is on the CCP, simply because they have more of a motive for it. From all appearances, NVidia was playing ball with the Trump administration. He was a frequent ally of President Trump, Trump supposedly knew about this information for the last year and sat on it, and even the CIA leaks that started it stressed how much Huang had praised the Trump administration. Reportedly they had already voluntarily stopped exports to MegaSpeed [2] as of June 2025. China, however, has a lot more to gain from his departure. It's going to harm NVidia very severely: reportedly he's very hands-on, "the conductor that makes a very complex operation work", and as a founder the whole knowledge pyramid that the company is based upon rests with him. If they want their domestic hardware industry to surpass NVidia, the easiest way to do that is to take out NVidia leadership.
I suspect that he was compromised by both the CIA and CCP, and with tensions rising between them, eventually found a situation where they each wanted him to do different things, and he couldn't satisfy both. Likely the CIA got wind that the CCP was going to move with their leverage, and published to stave that off. This also has the nice side benefit for U.S. power of letting the other side know the extent to which the CIA knows what you're doing, and showing that even the CEO of the richest company on earth is not immune to U.S laws. But it's still a net negative to U.S. power to have Huang out as CEO of NVidia, simply because it's such a net negative to NVidia. This is only a desirable outcome if he's going to be ousted anyway, or if he is otherwise compromised to become a Chinese puppet.
I suspect the role of the second affair was to show the board just how deep the kompromat goes. First affair, okay, it could be an indiscretion that happened in the past, cut ties and do damage control. But if there's a second (and third and fourth and many others?) affair and everybody knows about it, it becomes impossible for Huang to lead the company because everybody has so much leverage on him.
> My money is on the CCP, simply because they have more of a motive for it.
No they don't. They just lost access to Nvidia chips that they still rely on (even if not said out in the open). Alibaba's stock tanked on the news for example.
> I suspect the role of the second affair was to show the board just how deep the kompromat goes.
The role was to get the agenda off spying and export (the things you'd go to jail for)
They would prefer their companies buy local, as it will advance their local semiconductor infrastructure.
However, these companies would prefer Nvidia if they are allowed. All the advances in the past few years are due to advanced chips being restricted, so they had to step up.
It's interesting, the second comment I linked to was about the divide between Model Hawks vs. Hardware Hawks within the state department, and this comment thread is a great example of that.
Some people believe that the key moat for AI is the model, and under this model (hah) torpedoing NVidia would be bad for China and good for the U.S. because they won't have access to cutting-edge NVidia hardware for model-training. Other people believe the key moat for AI is the hardware, and under this model torpedoing NVidia would be good for China because it'd allow Chinese hardware makers to catch up and bad for the U.S. because it destroys our key competitive advantage.
Interesting that a policy decision depends so heavily on a question of fact, but that isn't unique to this issue. (I suspect that left and right would agree on abortion if they could agree on whether personhood begins at conception or birth, but they don't, so). There's also an element of time preferences here too: it's likely that model training is dominant now, but hardware will be dominant when you project out a few years, and so both factions could be right but on different timescales.
> Reading between the lines, what probably happened is that Jensen didn't come totally clean with the board on Nov 8 and tell them about the 2nd K Powell affair. Instead, the board got totally blindsided and lost trust in him. (Is there another 3rd secret affair he's hiding from us?!?) It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances.
Exactly my read as well. "If you find two ants in your kitchen, the best estimate of the total number of ants in your kitchen is not two."
My understanding is that the legal protections for the board of directors can quickly evaporate if they know about such lies and do not take actions. This is a major point of contention in the Oxford LLC bankruptcy proceedings per my understanding after the founder was found to have been persuing several kinds of fraud.
After they caught him in a lie, they may not have been able to not fire him.
They can't legally not fire him. But they can legally re-hire him after firing him. So ironically the ONLY way he can continue at nVidia is by being fired - we just have to wait a few days and there will be an Altman-like resurrection.
This is a paraphrase of the less technical-sounding: "if you find two ants in the kitchen, you don't have a two-ant problem" which I definitely heard my mom say in the 90s (about actual ants, not metaphorically).
I have a feeling this one falls in the same category as "sweet summer child", which, while technically as old as the hills, only hit critical mass after game of thrones popularised it
I don't think this has anything to do with trust. It's absurd not to trust Huang as the best possible CEO for the company that he brought from zero to 5 trillion dollars in value. It's about being afraid of public opinion, and especially fear of being blamed for not taking the expected decision.
Yeah, I'm wondering this too. Jensen's damn good at his job, love him or hate him. I genuinely am struggling to understand why they'd remove him unless there's more they know that we don't.
I don't think there is anything more to it than self preservation. All humans and I'd say living beings are good at it.
This is why martyrs are so praised. You have to overcome this instinct of self preservation to give up your life. I suspect most people can't do it in the heat of the moment.
Basically what others have said, it doesn't matter if Jensen is good at his job or even if nVidia prospers under Jensen. I don't think the board members care one lick about that. What matters to them is their own self interest and it takes a lot of experience to realize that executive leadership and even the board does not instinctively value the goals of the organization above their own self interest. I submit this is true because of the massive amount of bribing err I mean incentive alignment that the organization gives in terms of like stock options or bonuses for meeting certain targets.
He got honeypotted by a rival superpower and appears to have actively helped to circumvent national security concerns and export controls to the tune of tens of billions of dollars.
My god, how much more spectacular could his mistakes be? Does he have to eat a baby live on TikTok while proclaiming "transistors are dead, we're going back to vacuum tubes" or something?
There are very few human beings in history who could have taken nVidia from zero to megatrillions like he did, but the idea of him continuing to run the company after this is absolute absurdity.
if you think getting powned by chinese intelligence is 'stupid mistakes' you are extremely missinformed about the lengths they will go through and the resources they will deploy.
you really dont understand or know how such a placement works. They can very easily do it to you regardless of how paranoid you are.
everyone can be fished.
the simple fact China had to deploy an operative to get yo him means he and Nvidia are well secured. its an expensive and risky option, not the first by far and intelligence agency would take to get to someone.
They know that media and politicians were asking for his head, and that it was riskier for their own asses to resist than to concede. It's that simple.
I think you missed the point. An average person may hold their alcohol and operate, but we don't approve cops being drunk on the job.
Huang betrayed 38 years of trust his wife put into him and recently betrayed the Board by lying to them. That's already admitted, no ifs or buts. He clearly had reasons, as he is a sane person. His reasons were romantic engagement with (alleged) spy. Since he is a sane person, he must have weighed pros and cons and still engage in an affair, even though it jeopardized his marriage and his job. The Board needs to do bunch of "what ifs" in such situation, including paranoid ones, such as "what if this woman had such access to NVIDIA tech stack that each cheap is infused with some form of Chinese virus". We simply don't know how far this goes, but this firing certainly shows much further than just a consequence of a romantic fling.
Also worth noting that in the event his wife doesn't stand by him, this immediately becomes the second largest divorce settlement in history (behind only Bill and Melinda Gates). That's not the kind of headlines the PR department is love with either.
He produced a one-in-a-zillion success, and he certainly did it the hard way -- he was apparently unusually hands on. The word "genius" gets thrown around a lot, but I think it's apt.
But.
He put together a string of frankly insane mistakes that are now endangering that 5 trillion dollar company from both the inside and outside. There's no chance in hell that they're going to go from $5T back to 0, but you are not understanding the trouble they're in.
Internally, boinking your direct reports (who also happened to have a string of recent promotions) is incredibly ruinous to a company's internal culture, destroying notions of internal meritocracy. How would you feel if all your hard work was apparently not as important as putting out for the CEO? Do you think that would make you eager to do your best work for that CEO? And that's even before thinking about the insane legal liability.
Externally, he got honeypotted by a foreign government and managed to simultaneously mess with national security and, it seems, circumvent export controls to the tune of tens of billions of dollars. nVidia is in some extremely serious shit, and will have the government breathing down their necks between now and the end of time.
Next to the Nvidia chief was a woman named Huang Le, or Alice Huang, an executive of a Singapore-based data center company called Megaspeed, which was poised to buy $2 billion of Nvidia A.I. technology over the next year.
Though Ms. Huang and Megaspeed are little-known players in the A.I. industry, their association with Nvidia and its chief executive has recently become a preoccupation in Washington.
Commerce Department officials have been investigating whether Megaspeed, which has close ties to Chinese tech firms, is helping companies in China sidestep American export restrictions, according to more than a half dozen current and former officials and other people familiar with the companies, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an examination that is not public.
The inquiry, which is active, calls into question how closely Nvidia is tracking where its A.I. chips end up and highlights the possibility of American export laws easily being sidestepped. Megaspeed is also facing scrutiny from Singaporean police, who told The New York Times in a statement that they are investigating the company for breaching local laws, without elaborating further.
It's absurd to suggest that Nvidia would need to secretly ship a handful of chips to some sketchy actor when Nvidia chips have a a mile a line long for sales.
Jensen can sell his inventory 10x over. You have to have buying power just to get a hold of them.
Anything is possible but it would be extra stupid for one of the smartest people in the world to risk everything for literally no reason at all.
He's clearly not the best CEO for the company if his leadership has opened them up to a tonne of liability. The thing with Powell is problematic enough on its own, and yet it looks like a misdemeanor compared to the fact that he was sleeping with a Chinese spy and potentially knowingly sold chips to China in the face of a US-government-imposed ban. I just don't see why this is so hard. The best guy for the job is the one who doesn't risk the company and investor's money by overstepping into the geopolitical arena because he wants to poke some strange.
Lawyer here - I actually would bet this is not the case. Whether he came clean or not, the 2nd affair with a subordinate is basically always a firing offense under the sexual harassment and/or code of conduct policy, whether you are a CEO or not.
The lies may be part of it, but if you didn't fire them for the COC/SH violation, you would be in for near infinite liability because it ends up as evidence that the culture from the top was tolerant of violations, etc. THis is not conjecture, it's what has basically always happened in the legal realm when companies try to work around it.
Isn’t musk a clear counterexample here? He has had numerous liaisons with subordinates. Yet I haven’t seen either SpaceX or Tesla (who actually could) move to fire him.
Or is he the exception?
Some people get to have affairs with subordinates, others don't. It's a question of if they have the support of the people pulling the levers or not as to whether it's considered acceptable. Universal rules are for little people, once beyond a certain position they are merely tools for selectively shutting out opposition.
> the 2nd affair with a subordinate is basically always a firing offense under the sexual harassment and/or code of conduct policy, whether you are a CEO or not.
In my company, it's explicitly not forbidden, but the relationship has to be disclosed to HR early on (source: yearly training). That being said, I'm not sure what HR is going to do with the information.
The fact that someone's sex life would factor into the decision at all is so backwards.
First, polyamory has been gaining popularity. But a lot of poly people I've met keep that strictly secret, because their friends and family wouldn't understand and would judge them harshly.
Second, the problem isn't that he slept with someone other than his wife (we don't know what kind of agreements they have in place, and ENM is a thing in 2026). It's that he slept with a subordinate. And that's a real problem due to the power differential that exists between him and his employees.
So it's not the second affair per se, but bad judgement. Dating at companies should only happen parallel in the hierarchy, not up or down.
What I'm pushing back on is the notion that someone should be judged simply for fucking someone who isn't his wife. There's a reason people keep ENM agreements a secret, due to the judgmental attitude from the public at large.
Hopefully alternative lifestyles will become normalized to the point where our descendants in 30 years will look back on us with the same disappointment that we look back in 1996 gay marriage laws.
ENM among older couples is particularly common. But sure, it's always possible that Jensen was just cheating on his wife without consent. The thing to watch for is whether his wife has expressed unhappiness publicly about the situation. Notice that in articles like https://archive.is/Ubg4k they'll do everything but ask her how she feels. Or if they have, it's possible she's refused to say anything on the topic. That silence means something, and we don't know what. So hold off on the judgments until we have confirmation that she's actually unhappy with it.
The spy was also a customer. This is two pretty broad violations of your usual HR policies at minimum even if you remove “spy” from the equation and ignore all the sales to sketchy parties.
From the article's first paragraph: "Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang resigned Thursday, capping a spectacular downfall for a poster boy of the artificial intelligence boom whose exit following reports of extramarital affairs now thrusts the chipmaker into an uncertain future."
For a lot of people, it's about the sex. In fact if you only read the first paragraph, you'd come away thinking it was solely about the sex.
At least on HN the sentiment is more nuanced though, which is good.
> Instead, the board got totally blindsided and lost trust in him. (Is there another 3rd secret affair he's hiding from us?!?)
That seems to be the most natural guess based on public information, but it's equally plausible that the board knows more than the public already, whether because they drove investigations, received disclosures from Huang, or received insider tips once the heat started rising. Trust aside, they may already might know worse and more materially or legally impactful things.
That's the kind of thing that a healthy class of professional journalists can help uncover and trace in a way that our post-journalism world is losing the opportunity to do. Even still, I wouldn't be surprised if further scandals for Huang or Nvidia started being reported in coming days and weeks. You might be right that it was just too many sex scandals and general loss of trust, but we just can't expect to know yet.
We need to be careful not to equate the two affairs as being countable apples-to-apples. An affair with a customer executive that generates several billions dollars of revenue has a much different risk/reward profile for the board than an affair with a direct report employee within the company. The former also has much lower legal risk: bribery laws aren’t properly calibrated for this circumstance and sexual harassment laws are less applicable. As far as the board is concerned, I imagine they’re fine with him having an affair for every single $5B+ signature as long as he’s delivering the goods and doing so without getting caught so overtly that sales are impacted — thus the vote of confidence! — but that internal affair suggests bad judgment rather than greed-driven judgment, and exposes Nvidia to harassment discovery claims and/or exposes that he lied to the board about not having internal affairs, so he’s out.
Assuming that federal law is enforced neutrally and uniformly, your point is completely correct.
That assumption has not held to date in this presidential cycle, and Jensen Huang has openly had the backing of that president. From a financial perspective, that would considerably lower their financial risk estimate of either having to pay a fine and/or hand over one or two C-level executives for some rich person prison-vacation time. I would assume the board is competent and has verbally, off the record, discussed how many billions of dollars they expect to be fined in the worst case and accepted that as the cost of doing (corrupt) business, but we could get lucky and find they did so with a paper trail that’ll come out in court someday :D
No, I’m assuming it’s not an applicable coincidence here in this specific instance, since the Board wouldn’t have made a statement of faith on November 8th if it was; they are likely an amoral entity but definitely neither an irrational nor oblivious one, and the elections outcomes were well understood by then.
> Jensen Huang had an intimate relationship with a second employee, according to two people familiar with the matter, Reuters has learned... Reuters is not naming the employee.
Jensen's PR strategy with his open letter was to draw attention TO his affairs. It's a "limited hangout" strategy.
If we're just going to be purely speculative anyway, it could be the case Jensen is the one who himself leaked the 2nd affair, in order to continue this distraction strategy.
I wouldn't be surprised if 100% of the info we have on this is Jensen's PR. 1) Anonymous "leak" tweets are all PR agency slop -- real jouranalist scoopers would take credit to draw attention to themselves. 2) Any Federal investigators aren't going to say 1 word to the public. Ergo, it was always Jensen trying to keep the narrative on his affairs.
And if you want to be TRULY conspiratorial about it, perhaps one or both of the affairs never existed, only the smuggling.
There are certain lines CEOs of this level absolutely cannot cross, and a relationship with a subordinate is one of them. Hiding it, putting the entire company at risk for it, a board can’t trust a ceo that puts their extramarital dalliances ahead of the company’s interest.
Chips to China, on the other hand, is in the company’s interest. That’s what lawyers and lobbyists are for, and when they behave enough, that’s also what “rockstar” CEOs are for.
Jensen got too big for his leather jacket. Simple as.
It may be that, but I feel it's more about managing public perception. Potentially leaking secrets to a literal (stated) enemy of state feels much more catastrophic than infidelity (obviously his wife may not feel that way).
If someone has been:
1. Managing the company well
2. Attracting and retaining good talent
3. Making money for shareholders
4. Building strong company fundamentals
Then forcing a resignation over this seems... odd. I was under the impression that barring this infidelity, Huang was one of the more sane tech CEOs. I feel like I could to literally any other CEO (Zuckerburg, Bezos, Musk, Ellison, Gates, Jobs) that have done something equally bad or worse, and haven't had to resign.
So to preface, I do not condone adultery / office affairs, etc.
But in the big picture, isn't it crazy that a relationship between two consenting adults is a bigger deal, and of larger impact to the economy, than an action that is supposedly unlawful and threatened national security?
First, his actions were alleged to have impact on national security, but that is not for sure. It is for sure that he was acting inappropriately as a boss, though. Second, I suspect that it is both events which led to his firing. If the affair with the subordinate had come out first, and then the affair with the alleged spy, I suspect he still would've been given grace for the first but not the second event.
Once I worked at a company where the sales VP got caught embezzling by setting up (large amounts of) fake affiliates.
It boosted the overall revenue numbers, and I think they were impressed at how long he had gotten away with it, so they let him be ‘stolen’ by a competitor (who didn’t know the circumstances) while they swept it under the rug.
It's about lying. The proper procedure is to disclose consenting relationships with a subordinate so that HR and the board is aware of conflicts of interest
If an exec is lying about this, what else might they be lying about? Embezzlement? Corruption?
It’s a kind of corruption; specifically that the senior may have coerced the junior. And once it’s done, the junior can blackmail the senior. Since you can’t reliably determine that it was all mutually agreeable, you have to rule it out by policy. Same as emoluments.
you make it sound like hes the only person working at nvidia. he did good things but the company will continue to do good things as countless talented individuals make up the company.
Right, and to make it explicit for some people following along who are wondering why companies have that policy... It's to prevent predatory and abuses of power. There's a power imbalance that can easily lead to exploitation.
Adding on to that clarification: The leverage the boss has over the employee creates a rational pressure for the employee to ignore any boundary they might have otherwise had in order to avoid any chance of the boss using that leverage against them.
The reason companies care about this so much is more practical than moral. Bosses having sexual/romantic relationships with employees leads to irrational decisions that are bad for the business.
Because it's likely sexual harassment. In two ways:
1 - did she feel pressured to have a relationship with him? It's hard to have genuinely free consent when he can make or break her career; and
2 - sexual discrimination towards every other employee. Did she get benefits from the relationship? It's more than fair for the rest of the employees to wonder if they'd also been eg sucking his dick if they would have gotten better raises, faster promotions, etc.
> isn't it crazy that a relationship between two consenting adults is a bigger deal, and of larger impact to the economy, than an action that is supposedly unlawful and threatened national security?
The issue with workplace relationships with subordinates is that the degree of consent is often not clear.
This is the same sort of timeline argument Noam Chomsky gave me regarding why he thinks that Zelensky stopped negotiating with Russia after Boris Johnson’s visit. After the firefights in Bucha he was still saying they’ll have to make a deal, then Johnson arrived and said Putin is not a man to make deals with. And then Zelensky stopped saying it. I asked Chomsky about this explicitly (whether the discovery of bodies shot point blank in the aftermath of the Russian withdrawal from Bucha was the decisive factor) and he pointed to the timeline. I don’t know if I fully buy that argument:
Would love to hear more about this - is there a timestamp within the video where the relevant discussion is? Other sources? Ukraine shifted pretty dramatically to offensive operations within Russia in late-2025/early-2026 and I'm curious why.
Chomsky has pretty terrible track record on ascribing motivations in the conflict, going back to Khmer Rouge. Should have really stuck to formal languages.
> what probably happened is that Jensen didn't come totally clean with the board on Nov 8 and tell them about the 2nd K Powell affair
This is the right line of thinking, but I don't think a second affair is enough. To me, it says there is more we don't know. Possibly a lot more, and a lot worse than a second affair. Apart from anything else, that is the only reason to act this fast. You don't fire a CEO like Jensen in 24 hours over an HR indiscretion.
So I think both you and the parent are correct, but its a combo: he didn't come fully clean, but there is a non-public part that probably looks a lot more like treason that the board knows and we don't.
It's absurd that they're going to drop a guy that build the most profitable company in the world over 35 years of working every day, and is basically beloved by his own staff and the industry.
Something stinks to high heaven here.
Elon Musk has multiple allegations of sexual assault against him - he's had sexual relations with at least 4 of his staff including children with one of them while he had children with another women.
Elon solicits young women over social media to have children with (which is also soliciting sex).
He attacked his own regulators during DOGE, has direct meetings with Putin several times since 2022 (still ongoing), he's taken $100's of Millions in investment from Chinese state banks, special deals re: factories and data capture and sharing rights.
And more.
The difference is that Elon has 1) and iron grip over the board and 2) is an aggressive, spiteful person who will attack anyone and everyone - and everyone lives in fear about saying anything negative about Elon.
Jensen is paying the price for being a nice guy.
Apparently he should have been dragging the board over the coals, and threatening the press and industry to keep quiet, to quash the stories, to kiss up to Trump and make sure there's nothing but love from the government etc. etc..
" It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances"
I'm sorry but this is very not true and ... I don't want to be mean but it's effectively naive.
Elon tells his board whatever he wants to tell them including ridiculous fabrications about products, roadmaps, and handles them with total contempt.
> I think the 2nd affair with a subordinate employee K Powell was the reason to fire Jensen Huang
Hasn't Musk done this multiple times (including having children with subordinates)? He's still the CEO of a few companies. Bill Gates married one!
Boards don't care about this kind of thing unless they are already looking to get rid of someone. Worst case they pay the person off, and the cost will probably be less than a principal engineer earns in a year.
This doesn't pass the smell test. My guess is damning evidence was discovered which incriminates several high-level individuals at Nvidia with willfully bypassing the export ban. The second affair was leaked as a cover for why they were letting him go.
To me the fact that it was known for a year that the affair was happening, and nothing changed implies that this is more a publicity move rather than anything else. They had to make a change, improve their brand image. Probably nothing will change in how they sell their product, the rules they skirt.
He was also favoring local open weight models in a world where frontier AI companies are lobbying the government for control. Could be one of the reasons why he was ousted.
And yet from the reporting Trump okayed the sale so Nvidia argues they had a license to export from the President. Lutnick was okay with it too apparently and State didn't get a vote. If the reporting is accurate, then I think Nvidia gets zero blowback from the sale.
I think the affair with the Chinese CEO is a considerable factor. Jensen cannot possibly maintain any plausible deniability over Megaspeed's alleged diversion of chips to China and his role therein.
The second affair with an employee likely just dealt a death blow (if it hadn't already been dealt) to Jensen in terms of his ability to ride the crisis out.
Eric Swalwell was not punished and committed something worse than Jensen Huang, because he was a government official. He even ran for Governor and the only reason he as forced to resign was because of a different sexual abuse case.
If our own government officials can't face justice, why should the CEO of a company?
The fact that Nvidia was skirting the export ban was an open secret. So many outlets like NYT itself, Reuters, WSJ, etc have published reports about it starting over a year ago.
Yeah, this has to be related to the export ban. It's too much of a coincidence that the woman happens to run a shell company that funnels NVIDIA chips to China.
It's just unlikely that an affair would nuke his CEO's position.
I would be so, so surprised if the US government / CIA / etc wouldn't know at all that NVDA was selling to China and skirting the export ban in a meaningful way.
In 50 years from now, some declassified documents will maybe shed light on this specific incident.
I would imagine it being a form of "So, China, we'll let our Jensen guy sell you X in chips, and in return, you do Y in relation to Russia, and Z in relation to Taiwan. Oh, and we need to use one of your spies, in case someone f*cks up".
China doesn't even want Nvidia chips. They're holding up hundreds of thousands of smuggled cards at Hong Kong customs. Many Chinese companies want to take the easy shortcut of using Nvidia, but the Chinese govt wants Chinese companies to go through the pain of helping the domestic chip industry develop.
Plus the fact that there's absolutely no evidence that the lady is a spy. All media report anonymous sources but treat the allegations as fact. Singapore said their investigation of the lady is not due to spying, but no western media picked up that story. The lady traveled to Taiwan with her Hong Kong passport, and the Taiwanese govt also said they have no evidence she's a spy. The Chinese spy agency just started investigating her due to all the commotion (likely for smuggling chips, which China also doesn't want, see above), and also has no idea who she is. Despite all this, the public still treats the spy allegations as a fact.
Jenssen Huang is a victim. Those who wanted to get rid of him and set this up, have succeeded. But everyone is under the mistaken belief that this hurts China somehow. China doesn't give a damn. In the mean time, all Chinese Americans lose. Jenssen is not the first such victim, and won't be the last.
The timing is politically important though; shifts headlines from
"Trump/GOP lost their ass in midterms!" and "Dems intend to investigate GOP/Trump!"
Also provides news channel attacks on Dems; Congress should be looking into national security issues over here in CEO land! Not dividing Congress with partisan hackery!
Important to call out the social engineering going on among all the tribal groups.
I hope you understand the affair with the spy does not strictly matter, but he is in fact being fired because of the affair with a subordinate.
Like everyone, they have a COC/sexual harassment policy, and that is basically always a firing offense in practice.
They cannot place him above it, or else they would be in for infinite liability.
This is why literally nothing mentioned firing until that was discovered, and then it instantly became about firing him.
If they really did, I hope they at least go to prison for a while. I say at least because they actually should be court martiall-ed and spend their next 30 years in a military cell.
The strange situation, however, is that the current administration, specifically Trump, loves Jensen for he thinks that they're kindred spirits: both incredibly successful businessmen at the top of the world and at the top of their game (this is from Trump's perspective).
It's an odd situation where, yes, they're breaching national security mandates, but they're also being protected by the man at the top of the organization that makes those national security mandates.
We're living in a comedy film, where the outcome of said comedy film has an effect on the world economy, so we're actually living in a tragedy film.
That's how corruption skews the reality that the powerless are forced to live within.
China is a gigantic market. A company that profit hungry will find it supremely difficult to resist doing business with China. It is almost guaranteed, that they did in some indirect ways sell to China. It's also not like people like Jensen care one bit about the USA. What they care about is pure profit of their own kingdom. Uhm, I mean company, of course.
Frankly, you're being naive. When it comes to a massive $4 trillion market-cap US corporation and one of the most important companies on planet Earth, money is everything.
If the company struggles without him and it's obvious they need his leadership, he'll be back. Morals be damned.
> Now, back to the main point: your egregious comparison of a potential Huang-return to Jobs-return unfortunately still remains just as terrible.
Here is some reading material to clear up your ignorance:
When Chrisann Brennan became pregnant with their daughter, Lisa, in 1977, Jobs was a young man in his early twenties just as Apple was beginning to take off.
According to Brennan, Jobs reacted with dismay and anger to the news, and they never married. Furthermore, for several years, Jobs denied that he was the father, even going as far as claiming in court documents that he was sterile.
A court-ordered DNA paternity test eventually proved conclusively that he was Lisa's father, after which he was required to provide financial support.
I have to imagine that Jensen is under an enormous amount of stress right now. I hope whatever he's going through he's got support. This all seems to be happening way too quickly to be just.
Like, maybe him stepping down is the right decision. But it feels like a hit job and something that was pushed through, rather than something that was properly considered as what is actually best for the company.
I'm dying to know how other tech CEOs rank on your "historical figures ordered by importance" list. Like, do you think Steve Jobs was more or less important then Harriet Tubman?
Globally? Honestly he probably was. Hundreds of millions of people have access to heath and finance resources they wouldn’t have got without the modern smartphone form factor and forced negotiation of unlimited data plans.
Ask someone in Bangladesh who the fuck Harriet Tubman is.
AIUI, the rise of mobile telephony in the Third World was driven almost entirely by feature phones, not the kind of smartphones that Jobs helped to drive.
Screw the stock price. If you looked into the history of how the company survived you know the company is now Intel. The US has probably lost yet another industry to China. Wonder if the Taiwan investments into the US fabs will now slow because a lot of them were relationship based...thanks to Jensen.
I hope I am wrong but I am starting to think the US left is about to walk into a historical economic collapse that they are inevitably increasing the chances of by 'doing the right thing'.
I wasn't referencing shareholder value - but it sounds like you have an Overton window dismissing the value that AI CPUs have provided-facilitated, if you weren't able to understand what I was referencing holistically; so you seem to have a bias.
What’s the revenue target I need to hit to get a free pass for sanctions avoidance? What other rules, regulations and laws do you think he should be absolved from considering NVIDIAs quarterly profits?
He's no saint, of course. That being said, he is human and he's going through a lot right now. Its easy to dismiss someone's struggle because he's wealthy and powerful, and because it is his own fault, but somewhere buried in this story there is a human person who is suddenly the center of a lot of very negative attention. It is not wrong to hope that he is okay.
Which country? The country of Taiwan where he’s from and where all his products are made? Or the USA whose diva in chief has had a fit about selling said chips to the country who produces all the USA’s stuff?
Some very harsh words being thrown around for Jensen’s very human failings. Try walking in his shoes, or at least having some degree of understanding and empathy.
Try walking in his shoes? He has an easier life than 99% of people lol. People always quick to jump in to defend the shittiest behaviour, maybe have some empathy for his wife?
Well conversely you’re labelling and attacking what you consider the shittiest behaviour, when you only have a sliver of detail. Try pondering what it’s like to create a $5trillion company leading the 21st century’s biggest boom, and consider what weird and unthought of and irresistible demands that might come with. The guy started in Denny’s.
Won't someone please stop and think about the poor guy who will face the terrible consequence of never having to work again and still having enough money so that the next 10 generations of his family will never have to work either.
All of this sounds easier than everyone’s life. He has no consequences possible in his life. So many people, even in western countries, live cheque to cheque. Why would I feel bad for someone who chose to do what he did? Irresistible demands? Not cheating on your wife?
Crazy talk. I’m sitting on a beach in Italy right now. My life couldn’t be easier. The stress and pressure of running a company like Nvidia is off the charts.
Pleaze. Even relaxing on the beach one can read the news and gauge sentiment for their investments. And you’re right, maybe I’ll see Jensen hanging out in Taormina next week. Good place to hide actually.
Nah, not a bot. I do abandon my account here after a week or after I get a few hundred karma though. I hate this site, but I haven't found a spot better for the sorts of things that come through. So I abandon my account once I find myself checking karma, only to make a new one once I see insane shit being posted. In this case the insane shit was people white knighting a billionaire serial cheater who sold products illegally and ripped off consumers while simultaneously fucking a direct report.
Really shows you how much we need to kneecap these CEOs for societal good. The idea that they are hard workers is laughable. Everyone working in retail or a restaurant or in a call center is a harder worker than any executive on the planet.
Ah. So you know their relationship? Whether it's an 'open marriage' or not? Whether the wife cheated first, or not? You're of course, in the know, so you can judge, yes?
He could have done a wrong thing. Or the affair could have been perfectly fine with his wife. Or the marriage could have been on the rocks for years, and they both agreed to not divorce, with all the drama and media attention, and just live their own lives.
If it was an open marriage, why would his first statement have been an apology to his wife and family? I don't see any reason to start assuming it was actually fine. In any case the affair becoming public in such a way would still be hurting them - the media attention you're speaking about. Much worse than a divorce, right?
Because the public sentiment towards open marriages is even more negative than towards infidelity? One is seen as a mistake that one can atone for, while the other is seen as a rejection of the institution itself in a country that has strong beliefs in it. Still only 65% of Americans support gay marriage, for example. Marriage following strict rules remains deeply important to a lot of people.
Absolutely it is performative. Writing a public "apology" for spending time with another person in their free time is also performative. Nobody actually cares what you do with your life. They aren't thinking about you at all. But when performing, the performance has rules of engagement.
He wrote himself a press release saying he was unfaithful and because of his actions he hurt his family... it sounds pretty clear that was not a consensual non-monogamous relationship. https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/a-message-to-our-company
I agree with your sentiment in general: we should not make assumptions about the parameters of others' relationships.
But in this case, Huang himself explicitly mentioned the hurt that he caused his family. I don't think it gets much clearer than this.
I owe my family and all of you an apology.
I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and
our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am
deeply sorry.
Throughout my life, my family has given me love and
support. They deserve my honesty and loyalty. Instead,
I let them down and damaged the life we built together.
I take full responsibility for what I did and the hurt I
caused, and I accept the criticism that comes with it.
To my wife and family: I love you. I know an apology
cannot undo what I have done. I hope our family will heal
and that, over time, I can earn back your trust.
Bond: I doubt if she'll remember me.
M: Remind her. Then pump her for information.
Moneypenny: You'll just have to decide how much pumping is needed, James.
I think the "formal apology letter" wouldn't have existed if this was some sort of open-relationship situation. In that case, Huang violated an important agreement, and cannot be trusted to not violate other important agreements.
Money is not that helpful when a 40 year old intimate relationship dissolves. Being able to buy things does little for memories that can no longer be shared.
Such a bizarre take to me. Yes, it's a quick fall.. but can you really trust him after he's been caught having an affair with a supposed Chinese spy, _and_ potentially another one with an employee? There is zero chance any normal business would keep a CEO after this...
Normally this would never come to light, the admin has known about the Chinese agent since 2025, and there is an extremely high probability that they know of any other affair partners as well as what he had for breakfast and how he’s doing with the fiber in his diet.
If you think that billionaire execs of highly strategic companies don’t have the CIA nonconsentually implanted in their colon you are extremely naive. He misstepped politically.
I’ve known a lot of execs, and I can probably count the ones that were highly successful and never cheated on their wives on one hand. The temptation comes with the territory, and the opportunities are endless and disarmingly charming. It takes a man of outstanding moral character to be unfailingly perfect under those circumstances, and unfortunately outstanding moral character is often not what gets you into the c-suite. It’s a lot like rockstars in the 70s, actually, but with more boring clothes.
It is as much of a mistake to anthropomorphize billionaires as it is to anthropomorphize LLMs. People with resources greater than nations are .001% human and the rest is closer to a lovecraftian god. Consider that he can shatter markets or send massive trading companies under simply by having an affair. The empathy is misplaced.
He jumped in front of that bus himself. If the investigation turns out he was definitely orchestrating defying export controls then it's more like he drove one bus into another. He deserves every bit of embarrassment and ridicule no matter how impressive his business accomplishments were up to now.
Absolutely not. The value of empathy is not "have empathy because empathy is good", it is in the pro-social outcomes. Empathy is wasted, and counterproductively so, on the non-empathetic, especially on the powerful and destructive. It is a peace treaty, much like tolerance.
Are you and I looking at the same thing? Huang is a human, in every way you and I are. If he took a DNA test it would say he's human. Right now he is a human having what is probably the worst week of his life. A pretty good life? Sure. But empathy isn't about weighing what he "deserves" or making arbitrary judgements about how he should feel in regards to the level of wealth & power he wields. The fact is he's a human being who is experiencing a lot of pain. You should feel empathy for him and for the people he's hurt. If you don't, maybe you're more like an LLM.
I think the external event maybe moved quickly, but I read there was an internal event as well.
I’m sorry but this shows wildly inappropriate decision making. Say what you will about honeypots (I received specialized “warning” early in my career, but I recognize that is abnormal), but we all are forced through training every single year about how relationships at work, especially with imbalanced power dynamics, are inappropriate and should not take place.
I don’t care about the infidelity, but he represents the company at its pinnacle. He had to go.
You can agree or disagree with his position on exporting to China being good/bad for nVidia or the US. But actively working closely with a company (Megaspeed) where, from a thousand miles away, it was clear that their primary goal was to get around and/or bend US export controls... that's a bad idea. Megaspeed was clearly working for the direct benefit of the Chinese government.
Add onto that having an extramarital affair with the representative of that company? Come on, it's extremely likely she's an agent of China, and if not it's a gigantic business risk.
Then, on top of that, you have to remember that he's married. A divorce results in half of his shares going to his wife, who would then have a grudge, probably not in the best interests of the comapny.
To call it a hit job is absurd. He is smart enough to know his actions could have severe consequences. He took a massive risk on behalf of millions for his own momentary pleasure.
Not a single inch of empathy for his wife and family, nor the misled investors and staff.
I'll tell you what's absurd: Believing the Chinese government sent a spy to honeypot Huang into providing chips to Chinese companies, while everything about their public policy has been designed to prevent exactly that.
The Chinese government wants Chinese companies to buy Chinese chips.
Indeed it seems absurd, but maybe the Chinese government sent a spy to honeypot Huang into destroying (indirectly) its own company instead - knowing how western culture react to such events.
I think you're misunderstanding - I think the suggestion of a hit job is because of the timing of all this coming out.
His affairs have been going on for months or years, so much so that various places knew about it, did nothing to stop it, and didn't leak it.
I think it's a fair question to ask "why is this all coming out together now?" Nobody seems to know. In the absence of any other explanation, suggesting "hit job" isn't absurd.
> I think it's a fair question to ask "why is this all coming out together now?
1. Got too well known to hide
2. Republicans just badly lost the midterms. There is a lot of info that the President and head of Department of Commerce also knew about all of this the entire time and did nothing. They won't be able to stop investigations, and they don't want to be seen as getting in the way of them.
If that's true, the bigger story is not just that Jensen did all this, but that the administration likely knew he was guilty of Espionage and actually helped facilitate it by knowing but not acting. That is a real possibility.
To clarify, there is a possibility that the President of the United States and members of his team knowingly concealed and aided Conspiracy and Espionage against the United States.
There is no support for people like him, CEOs of such big companies, or even any respectful CEO. People would only use him. That's human nature for you.
I think finding humanity in our villains can help us gain perspective so I’d agree on your first point.
However let’s hold both thoughts at once, this was no hit job. Nvidia was forced to act quickly to mitigate business and legal risks. The eventual fallout they’ll face is still not fully known.
> This all seems to be happening way too quickly to be just.
Oh know, the consequences of my own actions have found me!
> But it feels like a hit job and something that was pushed through, rather than something that was properly considered as what is actually best for the company.
BUT THE COMPANY WON'T SOMEONE THINK ABOUT THE COMPANY
Sympathy for the guy having multiple affairs, including with a direct report, including with a spy and credible allegations of doing an end-run about valid export controls imposed by his country?
I have a lot more sympathy for the victims, not the arsonist!
The public fall may seem quick but from my read of the timelines this has been ongoing for a lot longer.
The idea his fall is related to his affair also seems more like an attempt to minimise the fact that NVIDIA have been covertly selling to China when they were not supposed to.
> I have to imagine that Jensen is under an enormous amount of stress right now. I hope whatever he's going through he's got support.
Jensen, if you are reading this and need support you can try looking into BetterHelp. You can even get 20% off using certain partner links. No one should have to go through the stress of loosing their job from Chineese spies alone and with BetterHelp you're just one click away from your very own personal therapist.
Someone of incredible wealth and influence suffering negative outcomes for something wrong that they did?
I'm not familiar with the thing I'm seeing.
Might call my financial advisor and ask him to buy some shares. They'll be lower, and the board has shown it can actually protect the interests of shareholders.
The real question we must ask is if a current $30k consumer GPU that initially sold for $2.7k is just as inflated as the 'AI' holdings revenue predictions.
The smart money will wait till the legal mess starts, as the dead cat bounce in the panic sell off is probable as people try to buy the dip. ymmv =3
For all his faults, I do feel for Jensen. He built this thing from an absolute scratch. He had a lot of luck on the way, from crypto to CUDA. And who can forget his spat with Jobs all those years ago.
Nvidia eventually had a spat with just about any corporation it has ever worked with. Their only partnership that stood the test of time is probably Nintendo.
> Their only partnership that stood the test of time is probably Nintendo.
But even then, the original Switch 1 homebrew relied on an oversight in NVIDIA's Tegra chip that blew open the whole platform due to the ability to execute unsigned code. The Switch 1 was actually pretty locked down. Nintendo worked hard on securing it properly, only for it to all be for naught due to their SoC vendor making a massive blunder.
I wish I could have seen what was said in the meetings between the two companies when the first Switch exploit was released, considering it was fully on NVIDIA.
Success in some areas of your life does not insulate you from tragedy. The guy still puts his jeans on one leg at a time. Probably very expensive jeans he throws away after one use...but still. The human condition cannot be escaped.
This includes his family and the family of those involved in the affair. Many lives were turned upside down.
It isn't the tragic human condition to have affairs. It's a choice he made with his free will. There is no need for apologia; he could simply have not done it.
The guy has enough money to buy an island in French Polynesia and never leave it for the rest of his life. You are correct he is still human, but he can do pretty well at making a new life for himself where he doesnt have to ever think the word Nvidia again.
In 10 years he will have a new family and new friends and this will be a distant memory for him.
Apple used nVidia GPUs in most of its computers. Around 2008-2009, nVidia produced a line of faulty GPUs that were used in the Macbook Pro. This led to widespread hardware failures, and was known as "Bumpgate" because the problem was caused by faulty solder bumps inside the GPU chip. nVidia refused to fully reimburse Apple for repairs because it wasn't contractually obligated to do so. In response, Apple switched away entirely from nVidia GPUs.
I think it was well into 2013 because both the 2011 and 2013 MBPs I had suffered from it. but I thought that was an apple issue (ie not soldering the dicrete gpu well enough to save money on it)
after the 2 faulty products in a row, I haven't bought an apple product since.
You are missing out, the M series laptops are insanely good. Now wondering how the field of ML would have developed if Apple had had Nvidia chips all the way...
And that's kidna funny because now Apple Sillicon has pretty great graphics on their own.
Maybe that's the lesson he learned and why he _supposedly_ was making sure his GPUs were still getting to China. Because he knows that the alternative would lead to good Nvidia Chinese competitor later on
This is why socialism/communism won the Cold War. They got rid of entrepreneurship, yet new and innovative companies just spontaneously self-assembled for the greater good!
> I think the biggest issue is to not have empathy for sinners and you think you are a saint…
At least that's only hypocrisy (assuming you are not, in fact, actually a saint--you might have developed habits and values that mean you are not likely to sin in that way.) At some level it's not even a problem: you want to aspire to be a better person than you are right now, which means you will hold values that you do not currently measure up to.
But thinking you are a saint because you have empathy is perniciously self-righteous. You can see something similar to this in the progressive movement right now, for instance.
Genghis Khan probably had bunions and I could have some empathy for the pain endured, but I don't because spending a second feeling anything for him is a second I'm not invested in empathizing with, and better yet, helping people that actually need it.
DO you feel for how depressed that WW2 dictator was before he took his own life? How sad and lonely the big "H" was? That stirs empathy in you? Not me. I make choices about who I spend my mental and emotional efforts on.
It remains possible to feel sympathy for people who have done wrong. He's one of the richest men on the planet, he's acted with hubris and ignominy, he's betrayed his loved ones, and he's also probably feeling pretty terrible right now.
> It remains possible to feel sympathy for people who have done wrong.
It does remain possible; he's a parasite and someone who's just had an affair. He wouldn't value the sympathy given, Neither himself or Nvidia would return the gesture.
They give null shit about you.
> He's one of the richest men on the planet, he's acted with hubris and ignominy, he's betrayed his loved ones, and he's also probably feeling pretty terrible right now.
He chose to have the affair and as having my father do the same to my mother; you get no sympathy for cheating. Let them feel pretty terrible, maybe they will find what it's like to be human for a change.
Nothing more than a parasite in the corporate playground. His actions caught up with him; woe is me. What will I ever do with so much money.
The human thing to also do is not pushing AI everywhere for the benefit of themselves and their stakeholders, to the detriment of literally the rest of humanity
Have you never been in a situation where you made mistakes, felt guilty, and appreciated the empathy and sympathy from fellow humans in light of all the shame and vitriol you received counter-wise?
This is his identity. Sure, he’s made some poor choices. Imagine Jobs resigning at the height of iPhone phenomenon or Gates at the very peak of Windows. Not sure if Jensen can bounce back from this psychologically. He’ll be broken for awhile.
I think a lot of people might also disagree with the consequences. Something along the lines of - if it’s all consensual then why does it matter. Disclosing trade secrets (wittingly or otherwise) or skirting export ban is a separate matter that does have real legal consequences if proven true.
"with a spy" where is the proof that she is a spy? It seems to be perfectly ok for CEOs to profess blind allegiance to a terrorist state, like Larry Ellison does, seems like a double standard.
Me too. If he needs somebody to take his place he can reach me at my HN profile page. I'll take the bullet and try to struggle through with just billions of dollars.
I think this just confirms that he had knowledge of gpus going to China and the board wants to minimize the damage now. His infidelity does not help but I doubt the board would have ousted him for that
If the reporting is to be believed, they ended up selling around $7.5B to China through Singapore.
They did ~$90B in revenue last quarter.
I sometimes can't imagine the avarice it takes to do things like this. Could you imagine having a $100 bill in your hand and going "Yea, I'll break the law and possibly destroy my life to steal $7.50"
>"Yea, I'll break the law and possibly destroy my life to steal $7.50"
It's worse than that. Much much much worse than plain greed.
Supply of manufacturing capacity for this kind of hardware is severely limited. TSMC can't produce enough to meet all that demand.
NVIDIA not selling 7.5B worth of chips to China does not mean they would lose the 7.5B worth of chips. They could have sold them to American companies, which are all in a frenzy to build datacenters.
No, this is just a classic case of treachery. Jensen Huang, whether bought, blackmailed or because of tribalism, has decided to support China. In an interview, he was getting very angsty when someone asked him why sell chips to China, and said "victimizing them, turning them into an enemy, likely isn't the best answer":
People refuse to believe it when it's a billionaire, but they too can be very tribal, even if they lived most of their life in the so called melting pot of the United States of America.
I think the point is that whether he did or didn't, there's so much smoke now, that Nvidia is going to be spending the next few years getting drilled by absolutely every law enforcement agency and government. Even if it genuinely turns out that nothing even slightly bad happened, it's quite damaging the amount of scrutiny Nvidia is going to be under for the foreseeable future.
> Nvidia is going to be spending the next few years getting drilled by absolutely every law enforcement agency and government.
Sounds like this was known or suspected at the highest levels of the administration (Rubio was discussing it per recent reporting). So the question becomes: did Nvidia use a cut out to knowingly avoid the export ban, and if so, did the administration know this?
Yes, they did. Trump talked about an AI CEO committing a crime in the 60 minutes episode, and it is speculated that he was referring to Jensen. And Marco Rubio was frustrated and kept flagging it, but Trump and Lutnick squashed any investigations into it.
It’s not the infidelity part, it’s the undisclosed relationship with a subordinate part. That’s covered in HR training and is a fireable offense in every company I’ve been part of.
While it's a fireable offense, my experience with senior management has been that the company is more than happy to help cover it up for them... until they do a bad, and then it becomes a quick ticket to can them without having to admit the real reason for canning them.
That's what everyone keeps saying. INAL but that would give any fired executive hella leverage when the board finally decide to unveil what they've been hiding. I mean, they'll go to discovery and ... perjure themselves? Really?
What claim would the executive have? They can be fired by the board for any reason (except for a few explicitly prohibited reasons), so "they lied about why they fired me" doesn't work as a claim unless you're alleging the real reason is because they're racist or something similar.
It makes absolutely no sense to fire him strictly for the relationships. So it's either deeper legal concerns or the board has other grievances and is using this as an excuse.
It'd be so funny if he started actually sharing knowledge to China out of spite after all these. I know he is way too rich to do that, but one can dream.
The only reason Jensen is out is because he doesn't pretend AI is an existential threat like Anthropic and OpenAI do to boost their own valuation/moats and to boost the anti-China sentiment for the administration.
More likely the hardliners/security establishment. Rubio reportedly let Trump know of the affair/spy suspicion earlier this year (April? I don't recall), and he clearly ignored it because he likes Jensen and/or he wanted to get in on the action as Nvidia was making bank selling GPUs to China.
This breaking just before a meeting with Trump/Xi and just after the midterms show a changing wind in Washington is a hell of a coincidence—or not.
Securities lawyers, among others. All this scandal is going to lead to shareholder suits, which puts a LOT of pressure on the board to act. They have fiduciary duties!
China hawks in the admin. Trump was on board with loosening the export controls so that Nvidia could stay in the game, which ironically would've prevented China's domestic chips getting off the ground. The Stephen Miller types (and whoever connected to ant/openai) didn't want to concede anything. This is beyond personal vendetta stuff.
Meh, not really. NVidia stock is presumably rebounding as we speak -- unless they pick someone political or unhinged to take over, this will just be a blip.
And I doubt it'll cost him much. What could you pay the founder of the second most valuable company on the planet who already holds $150B in equity? It'd be as absurd as paying Donald Trump.
> NVidia stock is presumably rebounding as we speak
Not in premarket so far, 12% down sing yesterday.
Also why would it do better? Overall Huang seems to be a highly competent CEO. Replacing him with someone seems risky (especially if the board is influenced by Trump & co.). Especially given that Nvidia never had any other CEO.
He is at retirement age and a zillionaire. So he is going to start cashing as he is no longer required to report the sale of the stock. He is going to liquidate.
Gates did it too and they still think he is a guru which he never was by the way; all of them are into this stuff when the hit their 50s feeling left out of the game while accumulating zillions.
Both of these scandals individually are usually pretty rough to weather, together they were essentially guaranteed to have him forced out by the board. He's choosing to resign the same way a cop under investigation resigns to avoid more public consequences and to hope to sneak away to a new job.
I have to say, this seems like a ridiculous over-reaction on the part of the board.
I think if you could know the truth, 75% of CEOs in the US probably cheat on their wives. They are not hired to be faithful to their wives, they are hired to increase the stock prices of their companies.
Like sure, if you're a good Christian, it's not good behavior, but ultimately, it's just having sex with someone. I want the guy to make me money and build a great company, I don't care who he has sex with.
It's not about the sex. It's about the judgement shown in cheating with a Chinese spy and a direct report, specifically. It's the lack of trustworthiness shown by someone who is willing to cheat in their marriage (presumably they are then fine lying to their company). And finally it's about exporting gpus to China illegally.
My understanding is that he has been very hands on, but it's also not that unusual for people who have built successful businesses to "check out" once the role chances from building an early-stage company to growing a large one. Whether or not that works obviously greatly depend on whether the people around them can take up the slack.
I'm quite interested to know what you mean here, between the lines. OK, he was running a multi-trillion dollar company, are you saying currently it's a over-reaction because of that, and the reaction would have been justified if it was smaller/bigger company? I'm really not sure what the underlying point you're trying to make here.
The guy changed the world, heaven forbid he sleeps with a few extra women. They were age appropriate for him. The guy's getting more punishment than the Epstein class did.
It is not about the sex! It is about the corruption/lying to the board/misuse of company resources/risk of abuse of power/impact on other people's career progression.
The sky is the limit. The problem with high-level CEOs having affairs with subordinates is that they create extra scope for insider trading, for blackmail (and thus for espionage, corporate and otherwise), as well as the ordinary stuff like people defrauding the company in various ways, staff being compelled to keep the secret, staff finding that their own promotion is impossible because the person boffing the boss gets their job, the subordinate themselves effectively finding they can't break off the relationship, all sorts of stuff. Lawsuits all over the place and usually some other secrets come out.
Whether or not you're arguing that Nvidia should just say, well, the worst his shagging around is going to cost us is X billion, price it in and let it slide, as so many seem to be, I can't give you a number.
He's facing one of the largest divorces in history, you don't think that would be a little distracting?
And if you don't know why leaders can't have relationships with their employees, that ignorance is on you. You're trying to insult other people but it just makes you look bad.
A lot of marriages survive even after stuff like this. Especially in Asian cultures. The fact that his wife is White is the only thing that hurts him on his chances here.
Or she'd be more than adequately rich, worth around $75bn, able to do whatever the hell she wants with the rest of her life, able to have impacts independent of him, and free of a sleazy worm who humiliatingly cheated on her twice.
Can't legally, or are you just talking about social pressure/policing? Because everyone involved are adults, and knew what they were doing.
Besides that, it comes down to how well he's able to separate personal life and work, and whether he continues to add value for shareholders (which Nvidia has clearly been an absolute outlier at doing, during his tenure).
But it looks like they won't give him a chance anyway.
> the second affair alone would fell most CEOs because it was with an employee
I mean realistically, no it would not. They do not resign for that in general. It is tall order for them to resign or leave when there is credible or proven accusation of actual abuse or harassment, there is not even that in play.
> At CNN, Mr Zucker faced criticism from those who believed the network gave too much coverage to the former president, especially during the Republican presidential primary. Mr Trump has also criticised what he saw as unfair coverage.
I will happily argue that affair was just an excuse for other reasons. His coverage was not pro-Trump enough.
> I will happily argue that affair was just an excuse for other reasons. His coverage was not pro-Trump enough.
Well you could, but considering:
1) Zucker's "too much coverage" that was internally complained about was him trying to be pro-Trump, not anti- (regardless of what the then-still-disgraced former President whined about)
2) his resignation came in 2022 while CNN was still largely free of the right-wing pressure campaign it has been under in the last 18 months pre-merger
3) … in the middle of an internal sex scandal investigation involving someone else, in the #MeToo era, when the company was trying to make it very clear that it would not tolerate such things
I think it would be quite a stretch to make your case.
Jeff Zucker was not even fired for the relationship, but for failing to tell the board about it as company rules said he must.
Again: top CEOs do indeed resign over this stuff. Because it is serious: it opens them up to blackmail and opens the company up to lawsuits.
I said "not pro-Trump enough". I did not said "anti Trump". Yes, it is long standing conservative tradition to call yourself victim when having pro-you bias.
2.) It was not free of that pressure, it was just not that super high yet.
My case is that sex alone wont make it. It is easy to make my case, you are kind making it for me by adding more reasons why it was not just afair on itself.
I'm supporting your argument by offering a straightforward, easily proved counter-argument to it? You're wrong, it's that easy.
> I said "not pro-Trump enough". I did not said "anti Trump".
He was not ousted from CNN for not being pro-Trump enough. If anyone at CNN ousted him for politics-related reasons, it would have been because he was too pro-Trump. Because he was, for example, helping Trump before the election debates, offering to have a weekly show with him etc. This pissed off a lot of his colleagues.
None of that is why he was fired (because it would have happened sooner).
He was fired because he broke corporate rules in a way that embarrassed them when they were trying to boot out Chris Cuomo for being a genuine abusive boss.
I guess even if Jensen Huang leaves scorched earth, he will have sufficient money for the rest of his life. On the other hand, any other person who invested into Nvidia stocks will have a much more serious problem. :-)
So, it would not be a dumb idea for Jensen Huang to leave scorched earth and "let the world burn" (and in particular cause utter panic in the AI sector). :-)
Resignation means that he can start liquidating his shares without input from shareholders or directors.. Divorce will also be likely. Affairs with the staff would matter if he had promoted people; who knows what else is in that stack. He had planted his own kids with no experience in tech as executives there too . He is a zillionaire though and he has enough cash for many generations.
“Hey Lisa! How’s it going? So ya we just fired your cousin who created our company. We were wondering if we could get on a call with you about replacing him and leaving your rival company? If you could call us back on 1-800-NVDA that would be great.”
If corporations just had feudal succession laws we could just have AMD and Nvidia form a dynastic union, no need for someone to leave one company to head another.
is today the best day in over a year to buy NVDA? From a long-term perspective, how much was he the one driving innovation, and can they be something like an Apple who overcame founder's reliance?
Obviously, only him could have great visions about NVIDIA. I am expecting a 'we are going to stagnate, at best, without Jensen' worded admittance now from those poor folks remained in the organisation, with all those visionary thoughts taken away from them so abruptly. CEOs are the one taking the companies forward!
I don't think there is a more hallmark visionary CEO than Jobs, and Apple isn't exactly doing poorly today.
Maybe the veneer isn't there, but it's very hard to make the case that Apple has in any way failed following the loss of him. Cook was pretty mediocre, and it shows that when you have a strong ship sailing, you just need a "not total idiot" to keep it going.
Hard disagree. Jobs polished things that already existed. They were never on the bleeding edge of hardware design and manufacturing when it comes to actual performance and capability.
Right, and he had the knowledge to know that consumers don't care about that stuff. So we got iPhones with excellent usability instead of windows phones with HD displays.
Building products for consumers and building products for engineers are seemingly not the same endeavor. I loved having physical buttons and a keyboard on the early smart phones. They were proper communication devices. Now they are consumer devices.
The counterpart is the state of Apple after Steve Jobs left in 1985. Apple was in dire straits when Steve Jobs returned in December 1996. Granted, Jobs wasn't CEO in 1985, but as co-founder, he had tremendous influence over Apple, though he didn't have absolute power; he left due to losing a power struggle against John Sculley and Apple's board.
I'm also reminded about the state of HP once the founders retired. My understanding is that John Young and Lewis Platt preserved the HP Way. However, Platt's successor, Carly Fiorina, moved the company far away from the HP Way, and HP hasn't been the same since.
This is a sad time for NVIDIA. I hope NVIDIA is blessed to get a Platt and not a Fiorina.
I think you are not giving enough credit to Cook. He trained under Jobs and is a world titan when it comes to supply chain. He is not some mumbo jumbo marketing/sales guy. Yes under his leadership Apple released some bad bets but he deliberately invested in a vision that Jobs created and spent years teaching him. This couldn't have been sustained post Jobs death unless Cook continued to instill the culture Jobs had created. Else you wouldn't attract the people needed to create marvels like their CPUs.
If someone else that wasn't directly trained by Jobs for years was hired, i'd argue that the culture would start to falter because one thing slides somewhere, then another, then another an soon enough 'A players' don't want to sacrifice their core years at a company that isn't instilling the values they want to work under. Cook himself almost went down that path with his budding career at Compaq. His family thought he was nuts to leave the growing company for Apple of all places. They didn't see the values that Cook saw in Jobs.
I don't think that Nvidias board will have any problem though finding an A tier CEO to run the company.
They probably will not get an S-tier visionary, but mature companies with deeply established roots don't necessarily need that like nascent companies do.
That's not a useful defense. I think everyone here knows that Tesla and SpaceX without Elon would trade at a third or a fourth their current valuations. People are invested in breathing Elon's gas. But if it's bullshit, like selling chips to a cut out, and making that cut out a priority customer, that undermine's confidence in all the reported financials having to do with AI.
Yeah there is probably more to the story. Like evidence he actually did something very damaging to NVIDIA/National security. Knowingly helped smuggled chips, divulged trade secrets, etc. An affair and unknowingly selling chips to a company smuggling into China would not be worth the risk of getting rid of him. He must have already caused pretty large damage that is has yet to metastasize.
I hope this won't change NVIDIA's refusal to block inference for unsigned and registered open-models in the firmware of modern GPUs. Anthropic and others are pushing hard on this. First the hardware export ban, eventually the software one via hardware-enforced execution controls like IETF hinted at
Not really tbf, it's an extrapolation. As far as I am concerned, there is growing concern, with Anthropic coordinated lobbying against open weights. The point I am making is we need strong Hardware actors consistently standing for hardware neutrality and integrity. Historically, NVIDIA has been very pro open weights. But at the same time, in-silicon guardrails seem to become the new thing: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49879883
Makes you wonder what would happen if the US ever wanted to enforce "certified US AI" on its chips
I'm curious how effective something like that would really be.
Nvidia can certainly put up some guardrails that will sound impressive to the dinosaurs in Congress, but can it really stop China from using those GPUs anyway?
This is a simplification, but is this not in some way similar to how the Switch 1 has hacked due to a design flaw on Nvidia's Tegra chip?
In the same way, even if their GPUs get this protection, wouldn't a state actor figure out how to get around it?
The entire article that thread references never mentions any hardware, at all, only their software platform. The "Watchdog" referred to in the (editorialized?) title is literally never mentioned, and it is not really a piece of "hardware", it is a piece of _software_ called "Sentry" that (clarified in the Nvidia blog) they run on Bluefield-4 hardware (the "chip") which is their network card. It only exists in $10mil+ clusters. Just an awful and misleading article and headline, and an awful thread filled with people who know nothing about how hardware works arguing over nothing.
Most of the hardware functionality from a GPU that models need is generic and used every time you use a GPU for any compute. You can implement language models in a GLSL shader; modern GPUs have been programmable for 20 years, that's the point of their existence. The best thing they could do is just literally nerf the consumer hardware substantially to make tokens unusable or stop selling consumer hardware. They don't need spyware to do that. It would also make their products dogshit.
More broadly, "Compute" is basically a resource that our economy relies on to a large degree, it has been that way for decades. And it turns out it's very bad when you just destroy the thing your economy relies on. And doing so doesn't solve problems like "Current computers exist today" or "Other people make computers". So who gives a shit about Jensen? Comments here talking about "taking him out"? What's actually more likely is just that really powerful people today are often corrupt and also really fucking stupid. He played a stupid game and lost.
None of this stuff is putting the current open weights genie back in the bottle IMO. Amodei using RoboStormtrooperGruppen9000 bots and going door to door to take peoples GPUs at gunpoint is a more plausible method of doing so.
Yeah, even setting aside the impact and implication on the AI-tech-driven stock market of such a mandate, I don't think it's technically doable to implement either. What if you modified/wrote your own inference engine which uses a somehow slightly modified version of model weights, how would you want to detect (at a firmware level) that compute to be an "unsigned" model over, I don't know, a video game?
Open-weight models, at an absolute minimum the ones that already exist, are here to stay, and will continue ([0]) to get drastically cheaper to run.
Either through technical means, or simpler: by law for American providers.
It's hard to believe the administration was not aware of Jensen's affiliations all this time. And time is pressing for Anthropic and OpenAI.
Of course it's about building an oligopoly of frontier companies controlled by the deep state.
It's sad that people talk here about some personal affairs when it's clearly about governmental control, but it's not the first time a scandal is used as a weapon.
Let this be a learning experience for everyone here: if you ever get the CEO if a US tech giant, then never f** a Chinese spy! (and never circumvent export bans while you are at it)
The “foreign asset” got him is what I want to say. It’s tough letting this slide from the American technostate. One of our biggest gaps between competitors was architectural.
Extramarital affairs are pretty common in our ruling class, so unless the media is conveniently withholding information, think he got in bed with the wrong folks.
One Blue Tsunami, and now all the oligarchs are suddenly turning progressive and transitioning! Trump was right all along. This is exactly what he was trying to warn us about.
Think of all the mistresses who will now have to accept and adapt to their oligarch lover's new gender -- Jensen has at least two that we know of, but when you see two ants in the kitchen, you know there are a lot more. I can't wait to see the wig Bezos picks out.
Can't help that it leaves a bad taste in my mouth that the China hawk fraction of the US government and associated entities (i.e. Anthropic) obviously brought the hammer down on Jensen here, even if he arguably brought about his own downfall with the affair.
I assume leaning on Nvidia to integrate chip verification and tracking to not let any unmonitored compute exist in the world is next, which is also in line with what the leading US labs want.
There might have been no such intervention. Put yourself in Huang's shoes for a minute, or a board member if you prefer, lick your finger, put it up to see how the winds are blowing and think of what you'd find. No need for pressure, just glance at the news and realize that the pressure will be forthcoming, and it won't/wouldn't just be "the China hawk fraction" (sic) but widespread.
But the valid decision is voted by board of directors, 10 individuals in total. To intervene, the gov practically needs to persuade some of them to change their vote.
I don't think the hawk fraction holds actual leverage on any of them to intervene.
I think the situation is just the board gets overwhelmed by journos, panicked, rushed to a decision, and Jensen resigned knowing he has to leave.
> Jensen Huang was fighting hard to hang onto his role with the company he founded, according to several people briefed on the discussions. But an interim plan for the chief financial officer, Colette Kress, to take over Nvidia was well underway yesterday.
From the NYT live updates.
Ah well, I'm somewhat seeing parallels to the 2023 OpenAI drama, not sure if this is gonna be how things end quite yet.
He didn't resign because of two affairs. He resigned because there were a LOT more than two affairs. I'm sure they wouldn't stop coming after enemies and the press smelled blood in the water.
The "nVidia are selling chips to China" thing wasn't exactly a secret though. It was all over Twitter and the tech/investment communities I was in. And in the gamer communities (as we're pissed at how nVidia and the rest of tech have screwed us).
What you know and what you can prove are not the same.
What we can prove in the near future likely changed a bit when Congress went to the Dems a few days ago. Republicans weren't gonna make a scene about their $25M donation to the ballroom project.
I need to find the links but the reporting in Europe was that this was part of a deal where Trump got given a 20% fee for it (I believe those were his own words!).
It was reported together with the victim statements of the children Trump allegedly raped. I understand that the US media aren't allowed to publish any of these stories though so I can understand why few people would know about them.
It's not just that they were selling through China, but that they bribed their way through the Trump admin's efforts to investigate it. But even that was partly known, it's just everything is now coming up all at once, making it so obvious he had to take a fall.
..and because American culture is really prudish about that.
The French and Italians wouldn't blink an eye. Us Brits, we'd talk about it, he's get a slap on the wrist but wouldn't be sacked.
It seems to be a uniquely American thing that the CEO can basically do anything (lie, cheat, fraud etc) just as long as he doesn't get caught with his pants down.
Prudish about affairs with spies? Or about affairs with people who, if they break off the relationship could lose their jobs (or if they continue it they could get promoted)?
These aren't just affairs.
Also, fraud remains to be seen, and shopping chips to China sure seems like questionable judgement.
When you engage in an affair with a superior you have more leverage than you think. Yes you could lose your job, but if you lose your job you have nothing left to lose and can fuck up their life if you have the right evidence.
If you lose your job you lose your source of income. Your way of paying for your children, your house, food. You're left broke financially and mentally while the other party remains at the top with all the power to control the story and to further threaten you.
Have you seen how women are treated when they are part of an affair? The mocking, excoriating, debilitating media coverage? Heck, in this forum of probably more decent than average people you have posters describing the women involved as "holes" and "sides".
Do you remember how Monica Lewinsky was treated? Decades of jokes at her expense, mockery of her and her features, jokes about dresses and semen and blowjobs. Can you imagine how hard it still must be to deal with all that shit day to day?
Bill Clinton still has enormous power. He's had to face nowhere near the burden she has, and yet he's the one who cheated and he's the one who did so with a report.
I don't think that the US *care* about spies? Look who has been put in charge of the NSA, FBI. There's even someone who is strongly suspected to be a Russian spy working in the Pentagon.
These shipments to China - I remember there being a deal made with the President which allowed these sales to happen contingent on some kind of "risk fee" being paid.. to the President.
The French would not blink with an eye about a spy spying on the top tech company of the country? The French intelligence would probably got her killed.
Probably because of the power dynamic makes it really hard to see how free that "choice" really is.
And also puts doubt on any decisions by the boss that affect the employee - companies don't want people "sleeping their way to the top" as that's not putting the business' needs first.
This is a very successful woman, career wise. She’s clearly not incapable of navigating high stakes power dynamics and you shouldn’t just absolve her of responsibility in this.
We don't really have the ability to judge the power dynamic without intimate knowledge of the people and their personal lives, we don't even know when things started and what place their lives were in then.
It's why we generally frown upon relationships if there's any direct business link.
Because a boss has the power to reward the otherwise lesser competent women he is sleeping with over someone else who is otherwise better at the job but not sleeping with the job. If I'm a shareholder of the company I care about that, and the person wronged also cares.
As an aside, the above applies to any one of any gender sleeping with their boss (again of any gender)
You think the women that have caused Jensen to come undone this week are passive and powerless victims of him abusing his power? Except for his wife, it seems like it’s the opposite.
I am not talking about the spy, but the women who reported to him. Being powerless or weak is irrelevant. He had power over her and that was what "me too" was calling out.
If she didn't sleep with him would she have had the same position, received the same bonuses, etc? We don't know. Even if he wouldn't have gone after her if she refused she may have thought it could have happened.
Because it’s actually misogynistic to cast women as passive and subservient victims of power abusing men, when for millennia women have been doing all they can to get as close as they can to men with the most power, money and status. This is the most recent example.
Obviously over your head. Please don’t flame and cast peoples takes as “culture war garbage”. I was responding to the OP’s framing as the women as passive participants in this saga. Hard to believe that’s the case.
He wasn't getting sacked yesterday. It only changed when the second affair leaked.
Narrow-minded? I don't know, given the levels of insanity and in-your-face corruption we've seen pretty much every day coming from the US and particularly from the entire tech ecosystem it's really hard to understand the "norms".
I've read about how the US President raped a young girl (13) and multiple other victim accounts. I've watched how we've shown consequences to Prince Andrew, Mandelson and many others. I also see on Twitter the owners of this very site standing behind the disgusting people on the US.
I can't square that with the Jensen situation.
I should add that I'm personally in the camp of leaders who cheat on their wives or who make or accept bribes should be removed from their position. I don't agree with the British (or French/Italian) takes at all.
Just because tabloid news are full of usgov garbage doesn't mean every single human in the world accepted such behavior as new norm. There are still decent folks out there, dare I say a majority.
But yeah how can US folks stomach child rapists at the top of their power is beyond me, I've met plenty of folks with flexible spines while working in banking but this is on completely another level and that level is whole nation.
I agree - and I still believe that the vast majority are decent people. The issue is being ill informed.
The problem is that a whole layer of society have been completely and utterly corrupted to an extent which makes say a country like India seem to be a paradise.
Americans are prudish, but not such that he would lose his job over an affair. A few Americans would boycott his company - but not enough to matter. There will be general disapproval, but that is as far as it will go.
However he will lose is job over an affair with someone that he has any form of business relationship with. He can have an affair with a nurse in the local hospital of the waitress of a local cafe and we will ignore it. However the girls he had an affair with are off-limits, and should be for any culture for reasons that we think should be obvious.
Isn't there a thing that when it's consensual, tell HR and done? Or you have to be on the level at the org? It is not a law, but in my previous not big, but ~ 1K international org, many marriages and many babies.
Did he do anything besides infidelity, as it seems that the "board" knew about that anyway.
In any case, he fell on his sword, and I wish him well in the afterlife, nothing is black and white.
Not tell HR and done. Tell HR so they can ensure you are never in a place where you can influence her business success. It happens all the time and the rules about what companies do are very complex. As CEO I doubt he can every avoid the conflict of interests that HR is concerned about in these cases and in turn he can't be both CEO and have these affairs. (but the nurse or waitress down the street would be okay, even the CEO down the street so long as they are not competitors and careful to avoid any interaction with each others as customer/supplier - this is often possible since the CEO doesn't decide which widget to buy)
Hi. I was musing, not pro / con. I mentioned the power imbalance, and I am shrugging at his "wisdom" given his status, but hear me out, it's that everyone seems to have know and kept the fact as an ace in their sleeves. I am sure he didn't fly himself and his mistresses commercially, there is a crew, and gossip spreads. The truth is elsewhere, regardless of each's view on infidelity. I give you Gates, Bezos. Cheers.
The second one was a direct report to him, and I wouldnt be surprised if he granted her favors in exchange for the sex (whether it was "promised" or not) typically no executive 'survives' having an affair with a direct report and stays in the company.
Who you have an affair with matters more, in this case a Chinese spy wasn't enough, which almost makes you think, he was not the only one at Nvidia who knew.
Eh, I think they wouldn't care except that both affairs are potential conflict of interest issues. If it were like a random person with no connection to the business that he had an affair with it'd be treated as less of an issue I think.
The big question for NVIDIA investors is how much of their sales came from skirting export sanctions because you can bet there is an investigation coming.
The irony isn't lost on me that Jensen Huang suffered consequences for his involvement with mature, consenting adults and a whole bunch of other tech billionaires didn't for their island antics.
I think the affair with the subordinate was the big problem. That opens up NVidia to a lot of legal exposure.
The Chinese spy is bizarre because these guys have corporate security and cooperation of the US government. How was this allowed to happen?
Skirting export bans is an unknown. I honestly don't believe this administration would let anything bad happen there. Jensen Huang is simply too rich and NVidia too big.
> The Chinese spy is bizarre because these guys have corporate security and cooperation of the US government. How was this allowed to happen?
Yeah, this is the most interesting part to me.
It points to the US government knowing about this, and holding onto it as compromat until the time was right to kick him out. But I don't even have a guess as to why this was viewed as the right time...
eh, there is a rumour that it was one of those 'open' marriages, given that his daughter was seen with him and Alice Huang in a video, implying they were ok with it. (dunno about the second one though, but given the first, the second seems excused as well)
Nah, this is about the indirect Chinese access to chips, and this whole cheating thing is a cover. He's confessing to a 'lesser' crime to save himself for the real threat of jail.
My conspiracy theory is that its American spies who let this go public to pressure him out because Jensen was fighting their agenda of stopping China getting advanced chips. The flow will probably slow for a while, domestic Chinese companies will be forced to adapt, and as a bonus the USA wont even be competitive because they took their best horse out behind the woodshed and shot it to stop someone else from getting a ride. 12 months from now Jensen is gonna be VP of AI hardware at Huaweii or similar, calling it now. Another A+ geopolitical move from an administration that has been in a class of its own right from the beginning. Im a nobody who knows nothing but if I had to bet it would be on this.
If shareholders want to save the company fu-g board of directors should be replaced completely and Jensen back.
Colette Kress has brain of Marisa Mayer who destroyed Yahoo. A woke clown to lead technology company? No vision, no skills, no understanding of technology.
Huh, between the Anthropic IPO, the big shift in political environment, and the change in outlook for tech stocks, this comes at a pretty pivotal moment to see if AI train keeps accelerating at the same pace or if we start to see the end of the bubble.
I don't want to sound like a Jensen apologist, obviously huge missteps on his part, but he was quite a figure in shaping the last few years broad economic narrative. Good or bad, he was a force in shaping one of the largest investments ever. Does that shift without him? Does it shift really quick?
I would have preferred a slow fade into the sunset as a opposed to a dramatic exit. Yes, there would have always been a correction, but the bubble bursting explosively vs a more measured, slower correction will have different broader impacts and I just hope this doesn't push more towards the outcome that hurts a lot more.
I've seen some people speculate whether or not he'll be a prosecuted/arrested. It's difficult to believe, but surely would be the biggest imprisonment that I can remember from recent memory.
There is a lot of discussions on Export Ban. Does selling to a Singapore Company with Chinese Stakeholders considered illegal under those ban? Does Nvidia have to track every single GPU sold or even resold?
I was under the impression he sold it to a Singapore company, or even any other companies. What those companies do with those GPU is not his fault.
'Singaporean' company whose former managing director (Chinese national Alice Huang / Huang Le) and owner (through a self-titled company) is the same person he's had an extramarital affair with.
The same company they've audited the datacentres of, and saw dummy non-running servers within which had been stripped of their GPUs, and were 'fooled' that they were simply yet to be commissioned.
The point is that there is clearly knowledge of the company having heavy ties to China - his affair partner owned it. Therefore, heavy caution should be taken with regard to export controls. Instead it acted like a gold stamp.
Yes US hyperscalers have plenty of hardware but are running out of 'warm shells' to put them into. It's not much of a problem in Southeast Asia.
So, I understand this is getting priced in to some degree, but I just don't see how any of this will change the fundamental core business value of NVIDIA.
Even if they have to pay a fine or increased regulatory scrutiny. At this point NVIDIA is more like SHELL(10 years ago maybe/during oil spill scandal) than a tech company. Its going to keep printing money with its chips.
So, I guess I'll timestamp my prediction that now is a good time to buy NVIDIA stock.
“some fines” could be a very big deal. Sanctions laws have teeth.
How much of Nvidia’s revenue came from infringing sales to china? If so, that revenue is probably going to disappear as now they will have to really be serious about export controls or face much greater pain. Some estimates I’ve seen is 30% of their revenue perhaps disappearing overnight!
Sure, but then that would mean they can now take those chips and sell them to Musk, Zuck, or Dario at inflated prices instead.
And I'm pretty sure any CEO with at least a bachelors degree knows about the De beers diamonds story, so, I really find it hard to believe they will struggle with the concept of maintaining their artifical scarcity/demand.
If 30% of their chips were going to China and now they have to stop that, it means they will have an excess supply of chips and the prices would go down instead of up.
They'll be fine for a few years with a talking donkey running the place because they have a roadmap. And then when the situation on the ground has changed and the future is ambiguous, they will nosedive like SGI did. My money is on Huawei now. Way to go America! You've actually outdumbed the CEO's poor choices of mistresses.
Sort of agree but he did go around and spoke how export controls to China have no effect, and then he's in bed with a foreign asset, so lots of geopolitical stuff in there.
Plus whole lot of people waiting for that signal that the "AI bubble " is about to burst. No bubble will be bursting as a cause of this.
Well, AI bubble is not going to burst, probably ever.
We have a new equivalent to something like Web 2.0 boom, Its not like the dot com bubble, because its not actually made up of a lot of empty unimplemented websites with too few users.
Rather its already able and in my opinion has met Dario's claim about 'replacing all developer jobs' if a bit later than he claimed, alongside every other single job, nearly bar none, able to be replaced if it can be done via a computer.
For example, Fable 5.2. I wish it was cheaper. It's able to perform a build out of and then run an entire complex software stack, including dependencies/servers for internal opensource git servers with ci/cd and the full git and jira featureset combined, with spin up/server management across every major cloud provider and then use said stack to run a swarm as a collaborating dev team from every major llm provider.
I know that because I've done most of it (or rather Fable has). I started this project 24 hours ago. I now have:
Complete containerized customized claude code + codex deployment package with tacked on feature set 'plugin' mostly for claude + a custom-agent mcp that drives mostly codex for now, allowing claude to call codex subagents (so I can farm that subscription too), that allows multi level sub-orchs which make sub agents via said mcp with future work items being bringing in a modified hermes or pi harness to use across the board (Claude code stays until I can afford 20k usd monthly api usage).
This also includes a custom ci/cd deployment set of pipelines/management to aws servers easily integrated with necessary accounts, which was done adhoc as a replacement for gh actions, because of course I've used all 18 usd of my free usage on my private account, and then all 18 usd of my free usage on the git enterprise trial about 14 hours ago.
This is alongside getting ready to finally ship to prod several high complexity SaaS including international supplier integration, and a 'contact suppliers' module/role for high tier llm models only and an entire suite of CAD design and 3d model design with an array of custom tools for both.... which is now good enough that its actually production ready for my niche market. And I'm not even bullshitting. Its a good thing somebody on my team speaks mandarin and it isn't me. So far its been fine surprisingly.
Anyways apologies for the ramble, I need some sleep.
Its just so bewildering to me though. All that gobbledygook I just typed out is actually true, and I've tested the hell out of it, myself, I've had my wife test it, etc. It actually works. I can't think of anything I would need a technical employee even for now at this point. Because every bug I find I tell a fable session to make a git issue for and fix and then it does that and the bug is actually gone...
Now its more just the gatekeeping/relationship building hand shaking part that seems to need people still. I was thinking about a marketing lead but then I dipped Fables toes into that too...
I guess the AI vibe code everything bros that were infuriating 12 months ago, had the right mentality.
How though? Is there any legal cases where this has been sucessfully done before? And even they couldn't NVIDIA drag their feet on it for years in court?
Personally I think a bigger risk than that is AI models getting good enough to legitimately just reverse engineer and open source CUDA directly.
>, but I just don't see how any of this will change the fundamental core business value of NVIDIA. [...] Its going to keep printing money with its chips.
The key is that NVIDIA is in a fast-changing technology sector and that means the core business requires NVIDIA to keep innovating new and better products that beat the competition. Having a company continuously adapt and iterate future products requires a visionary leader that pushes the company to stay on the cutting edge. Competitors and alternative products like Google TPU, Amazon Trainium, AMD, Cerebrus, etc are not standing still; they're innovating too.
Many shareholders (including employees with RSU stock) are worried that NVIDIA without Jensen puts them in a weaker position for the future unless they can find someone with equivalent influence and vision.
Intel was once on top of the world with CEO Andy Grove running things. But then the followup CEOs didn't keep Intel at the cutting edge and they lost market leadership to TSMC, AMD, and Apple Silicon in various areas. The world kept changing and Intel didn't adapt fast enough.
It very much clashes with the idea held by some that CEOs are fungible and that the value is all created by ICs. But yes, semiconductors are at the forefront of human technology and you need the whole company (including c suite) firing on all cylinders.
A variant of that idea is the push Jensen could have he's already done by now. The company is basically set and it will continue to do it's thing into the future. Apple as corollary example. He just can't as one person have been in day to day of everything that made Nvidia tick.
Everyone is somewhat replaceable but the work they historically have done might have been critical to reach current stage. And Nvidia may miss on what he could have done but it will take a while for the downturn to happen and others are just as capable. They may find another internal or external candidate that may be able to push further. Market will price the uncertainty until then.
So IMO, it really doesn't seem to be that much of a fast changing sector. Moores law is long dead, my 6 year old 3080 laptop gpu is still damn powerful, rather we are seeing power efficiency/optimization now between GPU generations.
Its more of a 'race to the bottom' for price efficiency/hardware deg efficiency against price of electricity and price of the chips over lifetime, than it is a fast changing tech sector where breakthroughs are being made everyday that change the entire game like say with OpenAI and Anthropic.
I think the biggest problem is the way Huang was creating demand by orchestrating the financing of the entire tech industry. The CFO in charge can handle the contract details, but do they have the strategic chops and relationships to keep doing that?
And it was all high risk. It may be only a once in a generation founder who wants to orchestrate that risk.
And again, no one was expecting NVIDIA to stay flat, massive growth was priced in.
Massive growth is no longer priced in. The P/E is 20, despite anticipation that this quarter’s results are 100% year over year.
I would say it’s under-priced, but I get really nervous when my thinking diverges this strongly from the market. Previous confidence in my thinking has not gone well.
So, I understand this is getting priced in to some degree, but I just don't see how any of this will change the fundamental core business value of NVIDIA.
Even if they have to pay a fine or increased regulatory scrutiny. At this point NVIDIA is more like SHELL(10 years ago maybe/during oil spill scandal) than a tech company. Its going to keep printing money with its chips.
So, I guess I'll timestamp my prediction that now is a good time to buy NVIDIA stock.
He was at the top of the world just last week and now his career is over.
Slept with a direct subordinate - who btw rose quickly through the ranks - also slept with a Chinese spy and allegedly sold one of the most precious commodities in modern times illegally to an economic adversary. Hit job or not, he really fucked up.
Jensen Huang called Israel a "second home" while it was committing genocide against Palestinians. This is just a continuation of a pattern of corruption. I think he resented his own success because these are not honest mistakes. Jensen Huang is the AI Great Gatsby.
fwiw, this was seen at the time as a gesture to the large number of NVIDIA (Mellanox) employees in Israel. Both due to it being a major center for the company and because he had personally been spending a lot of time there meeting with the networking org.
Just a sad state of affairs. Jensen was by far the biggest voice pushing for open weights and keeping the Anthropic / OpenAI doom narrative from getting out of control.
Now without him there will be a vacuum for the ideologies of Dario / Elon / Sam to fill the void.
It seems like the two things are pretty tightly interwoven. Would he have funneled those chips if he'd never had an affair with a Chinese spy who happened to be a top exec at Megaspeed?
If you want somebody removed at that level, and you actually can, you can invent reasons. Jensen having an alleged affair makes it easier for them, and that's it. It's also probably less bad for Jensen that it's only an affair that Jensen is going out on, as invented reasons could be worse for him (like sexual assault allegation by three different women, for example). Just saying, I have seen it happen.
Stop with the gaslighting. This was nowhere close to an "invented reason."
He fucked a communist spy and he admitted he did it.
Not only that, everyone in his orbit was running interference for months before that on a DIFFERENT affair with a subordinate[0]. Why was everyone covering for him if there really was some conspiracy to "railroad" him? Or maybe Sam Altman's coordinating with China to honeypot CEOs because reasons?
No, you misunderstand me. I am not saying it was invented. I am saying, had Jensen not provided an easy ramp, reasons could be invented. I have seen it happen.
I am saying it here:
> Jensen having an alleged affair makes it easier for them, and that's it.
>He fucked a communist spy and he admitted he did it.
The communist spy is the invented reason. There has been zero evidence presented that Alice Huang is a spy for the CCP[1], and if they did have evidence it would have been more appropriate to charge Jenson last year when the Trump administration was made aware of the relationship.
Everything about Alice being a honeypot has largely been hearsay.
To me, it's far more likely that someone in the state department did not like that Jenson was circumventing export controls and manufactured this to bury him.
That’s not what that guy was saying; you’re taking hypotheticals literally. He was saying that even if he hadn’t had an affair or sold chips to China, a reason to oust him could have simply been fabricated if his rivals wanted him gone badly enough.
“Show me the man, and I will show you the crime”
I don’t think he was even making the case that his rivals were involved in this, only that if they really wanted him gone for advocating for open source models, it’s not like they needed this specific scandal to pull it off.
Appeal to conspiracy, the deep state didn't make him have an affair. Who, exactly, was trying to oust him? To what end? It's surely not China since he was helping them get their hands on chips. It can't be the Trump admin since Trump likes the guy and invited him onto his trip to Beijing despite Rubio's memo noting he was probably already compromised at that point.
There would be another smear campaign, sexual assault allegation or shady dealings.
It's easy to find dirt on everyone and coordinate the media to take them down.
He had to go because of geopolitics due to US/China relations and the AI race.
It has nothing with his "dick", that's just a story they sold to public.
> He had to go because of geopolitics due to US/China relations and the AI race.
Why? By all accounts everyone in the US loved him and thought he was the "le face of AI" or whatever. Would he have been ensnared in this scheme to smuggle chips to China if he hadn't slept with a Chinese spy who just happened to be a top exec at Megaspeed? If he didn't have this proclivity for affairs in the first place? The world may never know, but it can speculate.
Only because it benefits NVIDIA to have more potential customers in the shovel market to mine gold individually versus consolidating within a few providers (where the backend tooling becomes irrelevant to the consumers, and OpenAI & Co could freely change GPU manufacturers on a whim or move things in-house).
Yep, it's kind of the old "if you owe the bank $100, it's your problem. If you owe $100M, it's the bank's problem." NVIDIA would love to diversify its customer base.
I've consistently seen Jensen as a transparently self-interested shovel salesman while we dig our own mass grave.
For a person in his position, he has been exceedingly slow to wake up to the prospect of AGI - he seemed genuinely surprised by arguments from informed layperson Ezra Klein, for example, like he'd never even heard of it before.
The number of people here who don’t take sexual harassment in the workplace by the CEO of a world-leading company to be a serious, fireable offense—and the fact that so many of you claim to care about things like women’s rights and social justice—is mind-boggling to me. This is a man who could be fired just for OFFERING to have sex with a subordinate. The fact the he did it, and that she got promoted seals his fate as a predator in my mind. But we live in an age where the only truth people believe is the one that makes them feel a certain way, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
I've never worked at any company that used them or heard about them. Instead we take yearly training saying that even flirting with the idea is a cause for immediate termination.
Do you have stats on how common these are? Is it more popular in some non US country maybe?
Your companies had zero tolerance for consensual relationships at the office? Not even married couples? Possible, but the exception because that really constrains your talent base.
Good idea about stats. Please share what you find.
Do you suppose Jensen had a love contract with his subordinate, when the breaking of the news of their extramarital relationship led to a 20% drop in stock and the removal of Jensen as CEO?
You mean infantilising adults and denying their agency to feel better about yourself.
Obviously it depends from case to case and there are certain lines that shouldn’t be crossed but otherwise consenting adults should be free to make their own decisions.
Yes, you can extrapolate, and our society does. This is why ministers aren't supposed to have relationships with their clergy, therapists are not supposed to have relationships with their clients, lawyers, doctors, etc. The list goes on and on.
Can become, yes. Depends a bit on what exactly the nature of the power imbalance is. Which is why there are usually strict rules about relationships with your reports and how to resolve the situation. Like reporting it to HR so the work positions can be shifted in a way to move positions so that there is no longer a reporting relationship between the two.
Exactly. At every place I've worked or consulted at, bosses dating subordinates is not permitted. I have seen multiple instances where people have to move teams/managers because they start a relationship.
These restrictions exist in most workplaces. Boss/subordinate relationships can result in extortion and bad behavior, regardless of which party starts it.
Considering he was fired it's the other way around. This at most only applies to very small companies or to people at the very bottom on the totem pole.
Yeah. It’s not like being an ultra chad billionaire with great biceps and confident personality is NOT attractive to women. Maybe her husband wasn’t doing it for her (legit feel bad for that man, whoever he is, today).
Which most company policies allow in some form. Peer-to-peer is straight forward. Supervisor-subordinate (relevant here) is less tolerated. You just have to disclose it and maybe sign a "love contract."
Parent is oblivious to this and has already made up their mind that these policies don't exist
> The fact the he did it, and that she got promoted seals his fate as a predator in my mind.
These policies are intentionally narrowed to workplace conflicts of interest. HR doesn't want to manage morality clauses or stuff outside the workplace.
To be honest, even with those policies, a supervisor-subordinate relationship can be problematic. There is an undeniable power dynamic at play, so even when it looks consensual it's hard to be sure. I'm not saying it wasn't consensual in this case, but when person A can impact the future of person B, person B might feel coerced to "consent".
Anyway, not sure if that's the case here but it's hard to rule out entirely.
yall got it backwards. pussy is the power dynamic. men need it, have to have it, totally controlled by it. man not using woman for sex. everyone like sex. woman use pussy power to get promotion
I'm very aware that these policies exist, and I'm certain the CEO of Nvidia was also aware. That he decided to circumvent them says all you need to know, really. Even if it's consensual, what happens when she decides she wants to move on from the relationship? What about her peers that didn't receive promotions while she did? This is why these laws exist.
The implication here is that they didn't follow company policy or else this wouldn't be an issue. HR would have said, "Yes we're aware of the relationship, all of our policies have been properly followed in relation to it." The fact that we're not hearing that means the answers to all these questions don't have pretty answers.
> The implication here is that they didn't follow company policy or else this wouldn't be an issue.
I see your opinion. In MY opinion, this wouldn't be an issue but for the spy scandal. Now, anything that comes up (complying or not complying with policy) triggers more urgency by shareholders and the board to make change. They don't care about HR due process.
Maybe it's a generational thing? The younger generations seem to have some sort of anxiety with respect to consent and power dynamics, where even something as trivial as a modest age difference is viewed with suspicion. The movie Obsession can be seen as that anxiety translated into the horror genre.
To be fair though, a CEO having an affair with a subordinate should be seen with at least some suspicion...
IDK, if you look at the messaging around Clancy where women are completely subordinate to hormones to the point it excuses chasing down three children and systematically murdering them, or the Cornell 7 case where a woman can willfully engage in sex with multiple men and then only decide it was rape retroactively after explicitly negotiating with the men what was ok during and after with text messages where she defended her own actions but then when rumors started she decided she didn’t actually give consent…
The people saying you can’t trust women… are mostly coming from women.
Wild time if you are dating! Yes could mean No if later she decides she didn’t like something about it.
Even if it were about consent (and it's not), it's difficult to show that a relationship with such a power imbalance is consensual. If it were consensual it should have been disclosed. And as a CEO he has a greater responsibility to follow these kinds of rules. He knows it, and he did it anyway, and then he got caught doing it. There's really no other action to take besides removing him.
money before principles. Not to be crass but this is the ycombinator forum, not bluesky. do not expect principles before money, this is the absolute opposite of trying to preach to the choir.
In any scenario it’s not appropriate. Among peers, everyone knows about the “special relationship” and it directly attacks any perception of fairness and enables others to justify similar or worse behavior in the org.
Let's dispense with the theatrics. Having a relationship with someone in your chain is not even close to sexual harassment. Yes, it can lead to it but generally it doesn't. It's not at all illegal either.
When I entered the workforce not so long ago most companies didn't even have policies against it. My university didn't make a policy about it until 2012. I know a very happily married couple who got married this way (a little earlier - perhaps around 2006 or 2007). I don't think they'd be happy if I referred to their behavior as "sexual harrasment".
I think it's a good policy and it's fair they enforce it, but equating it to sexual harassment is nonsense.
You can't prevent people from having relationships. It's not realistic. My company has specific rules about this. Typically, "problematic" relationships need to be disclosed to HR and leadership, but they're not forbidden per se.
They may not think about it that way, but if one of that couple got a promotion from the other then every other person on the team pretty much has grounds for a law suit. There are reasons these rules exist, and the CEO of a high profile company has no excuse not to know them all.
> but if one of that couple got a promotion from the other then every other person on the team pretty much has grounds for a law suit.
Extremely rare (winning such a lawsuit). Prior to these kinds of rules becoming the norm, how often did anyone win such a lawsuit? It's a rounding error close to 0.
There are plenty of publicized cases where one party openly stated she got promotions because of her affair with a senior. No lawsuits were even filed in the ones I know.
I'm in favor of such rules precisely because it's hard to win such a suit.
Not sure about the sexual harassment angle you're pushing... it's about trust isn't it? If you have consensual affairs as a CEO, you are still liable to be fired if it becomes public, that's my opinion anyway.
It doesn't matter, he was in a position of extreme power imbalance where he could show her both favoritism or fire her depending on how things went. It's improper and inappropriate at best, and illegal at worst.
I'm... not shocked. Politically, HN skews pretty heavily right. Some of them will claim otherwise, putting rainbow flags in bios and such, but here is where the rubber hits the road. I also believe that the affair with the subordinate was the big problem. He can paint himself a victim of a Chinse spy.
Consider the case of Regina Santos-Aviles [1]. She committed suicide by setting herself on fire and had revealed that she'd been having an affair with her boss.
The power dynamics here are insane. Huang was the CEO and a billionaire. The legal liability that NVidia has or could have because of this is huge, particularly if they did nothing. Now there are big questions about who knew what when.
The reporting says somebody say them in a San Jose hotel and was basically hushed with an NDA, and probably a big payment (I'm guessing; I don't know). Was that from NVidia or Huang personally? What NVidia staff, if any, authorized that?
If the board wants to really clean house they should authorize a thorough external investigation of that and any other possible affairs.
If you truly believe this, you're living in a bubble. Economically it might be pro free markets, but socially it's heavily "progressive" -- see any discussions about Omarchy, LGBTQ, Elon, or Trump.
I’m entertained by how far left one must be to think HN “leans pretty heavily right”. Even the most die-hard socialist should be aware enough to find that funny.
I think media, social and traditional, has really done a number on people’s perspectives. I’m not sure why ideology replaces self-awareness.
Die-hard socialists often consider "liberals" to be soft-core right wingers. I'm not sure there's an objective center, it's all a matter of perspective.
I'm socially progressive but economically conservative. That's why, whenever there's a tough situation where compromise is needed, I always compromise on the side of "let the free market run amok".
Leftism begins with anti-capitalism. This is so far beyond the American (or even European) Overton window. The American political mainstream is a choice between center-right and far-right.
Politics is about economics. All of the so-called "culture war" issues (eg LGBT rights, bodily autonomy, etc) don't make you left wing if you are still an avowed capitalist. The success of the Republican Party hinges on the success they've had in propagandizing culture war issues to avoid talking about economics. And the establishment Democrat Party is complicit because they have the exact same paymasters.
On this issue you see a ton of people in the comments saying "yeah but Jensen made so much money" as a reason why he shouldn't suffer the consequences. If making money has primacy in your decision making well... you're right wing, definitionally.
As other commenters have noted, every time Elon comes up there are a ton of HN defenders, despite him being a complete fascist (in technical terms, not a pejorative) and doing the Nazi salute on national TV (twice).
> Economically it might be pro free markets, ...
Well, first there's no such thing as "free markets". Second, you're basically saying "capitalism". As I said, right wing.
That means he can’t have any affairs with anyone who isn’t a billionaire without it turning into sexual harassment due to the imbalance in power?
> basically hushed with an NDA, and probably a big payment
So depending on how big the payment the alleged victim might be pretty happy with the outcome?
I mean if the board believes that the actions of the CEO resulted in financial damage to the company it’s up to them to investigate and deal with it. I just don’t get the whole morality police angle as long as the affair was between consenting rational adults.
One may interpret this as the Overton window having shifted quite a bit over the last several years. As in "HN skews pretty heavily right" can be correct *and* it can also be true that the wackadoo faction of the right has dominated the discourse for a while.
To spin it another way: if we ignore the rise of the faux-libertarian (you know, the more typical brand now, libertarian but all for a strong military and christian nationalism), I'd argue that the typical HN skews more old school small-l libertarian on the right wing spectrum. That's quite a bit different from the MAGA, christian nationalist, style of right wing politics that has been in vogue lately.
But DOGE (as conceived) is the wet dream of a libertarian from any era. If anything it's a bone that Trump threw to libertarians. It's not especially MAGA imho.
On paper yes, but anyone with half a brain saw that the opposite was true in real life. They went in, made things worse, didn't save any money, and absconded with a lot of private data. My recollection from that time period was the tenor here shifted rapidly from generally positive to generally negative.
DOGE was less popular than most of the admins stuff, and more scandalous at various levels (the stuff they did cut was fairly popular, they didn't manage to cut the stuff people might have really seen as wasteful, they went about accessing data in strange ways, some of the employees were quite young and looked unqualified).
I don't think you can assume much just by knowing somebody disliked them.
The things they got the most attention for like USAID weren't really core dc money. if anything I think they failed to really touch federal programs much in the end, but they did wildly swing at other stuff (like infamously just word searching to cancel research grants etc).
That's totally fair, nobody is happy with DOGE at this point and a lot of people were skeptical and nervous as it was happening. I just don't recall anyone popping in to say "damn it, they're doing it wrong!".
Cornell 7 would like a word. That’s just the latest. The facts of that case so strongly outweigh the narrative of “poor drunk unconscious college girl rapped by men for hours” that it’s comical that somehow innocent until proven guilty is now “misogynist rape culture” or something.
Who do you work for? Curious whether they have annual sexual harassment training or not. I'm not pushing a narrative. Based on the facts that are public alone this is pretty cut and dry sexual harassment. You may not like the connotation of those words, but they contain a pretty broad set of improprieties.
Any company that wants to pass one of the many audits I'm sure Nvidia is subject to has policies around this. They would both know that not only do all employees need to disclose such relationships but that such a relationship is not appropriate if one is above the other on the org chart. Since the CEO is above everyone, that pretty much means if he wanted a relationship with an employee they would need to resign first.
HR policies around these things have never at all cared about which direction the relationship goes and it really shouldn't be hard to understand why. It's entirely irrelevant who initiates.
What's very "Cut and Dry" is that so many of you are very obviously not paying attention to the yearly training, which isn't exactly complicated or difficult material.
A good point and the line of thinking you're describing implies that power should override anything else. Rather than rules that apply to everyone, what level of power within a company should no longer be subject to firing for engaging in a power-abuse sexual relationship?
Misbehavior without consequences seems to have become more noticeable in politics within the past ten years, with mainstream news outlets reporting on insider trading and potential bribes for favors. This ethos of power over accountability seems to be having a trickle down effect on general sentiment.
> The number of people here who don’t take sexual harassment in the workplace by the CEO of a world-leading company to be a serious, fireable offense—and the fact that so many of you claim to care about things like women’s rights and social justice—is mind-boggling to me.
It's mindboggling that you describe an apparently completely consensual affair as "sexual harassment". That's absurd.
The term already has a well-established meaning; we shouldn't change our understanding of it. If you mean something else then use different terminology.
Also, I don't think there was an "extreme power imbalance". If anything, she had far more power over him than the other way around, since he had much more to lose and she could blackmail him with making the affair public or other allegations.
I am referring to the meaning established in the law. Many things fall under the legal umbrella of sexual harassment. If you want to describe it as something else maybe you should be the one looking for a new term to coin.
Obviously the situation isn't that simple, and neither is the law. If you really want to have a relationship with a subordinate there are legitimate ways to make that happen. He chose to circumvent those (ostensibly repeatedly, and while paying off people who found out about it), and the set of reasonable explanations that don't involve some form of harassment is vanishingly small.
I agree there should be equal accountability. The response to that shouldn't be letting everyone do whatever the hell they want, though, in my opinion.
I mean I said in 2016 Hillary basically behaved this way with Bill in regards to others (notably monica lewinsky) and against basically anyone else (i.e. say whole democrat party field) except Trump that should have been a disqualifying thing (and worse, if the republicans put up a decent person, I suspect Hillary would have won!)
At the end of the day, I wouldn't bash everyone here too strongly when everyone who lined up early behind Hillary basically acted in the same way. (And yes, even though Bill did the act, Hillary lined up easily to defend him, much like the people you mention here)
This whole thing is making me question whether I should continue reading HN. It's not just this story either, it seems a sub-section of the HN community has taken a hard-right swing in the last couple years.
People in these threads are pretending that 75% of the story doesn't exist and it's just about an affair... insane.
EDIT: Is this just X infecting HN? I don't go on X so I don't know what it's like.
People here are so weird now about AI. Bizarrely sensitive to even the slightest criticism of AI or the associated companies. I don’t know if it’s bots or what, but it’s legitimately scary.
Yeah, the election made it pretty clear that people on X are in an insane bubble world (rather than some of the other online communities X accused of exactly that), and that the venn-diagram of HN and terminally-online X users is basically a circle.
The Demographics of HN are coming very sharply into focus the past few weeks, and it's awful.
It does sort of explain a lot though.
A shocking amount of these comments are very loudly ignorant of basic concepts of consent, and some seem to be rather proud of it.
Of course not. They have sex, wake up in the morning and decide what to do about it. Instead of going through the appropriate channels they decided to keep it secret. Big mistake.
The imposition of "sexual harassment" upon a woman who has not made any such allegation or claim is just dripping with paternalism. Let her decide whether she has been abused or harassed. She doesn't need you for that. I know you think you know better than she does, but most of us consider her to have agency of her own and do not feel the need to substitute our own baseless opinions in place of her own.
This is really dependent on the company. Musk, Brin etc. have not been canned due to some combination of corporate culture and stock ownership structures.
Famously, Mark Hurd was fired for this, but immediately hired by Larry Ellison at Oracle because he didn;t give a shit.
You're getting mixed signals because it's both a yes and a no. Very likely not a "spy" per se - she's a proper business woman with a long career. Very likely in touch with China's information services - because she's a business woman with a long career.
But yeah, the "model" memes are completely offtopic. She's nearly 50.
Jensen has created more shareholder value than nearly any human on earth. Significantly more than Elon, with the key distinction that Jensen has distributed much more of that shareholder value than Elon has through stock options to employees and appreciation of public stock (it’s one of the reasons he’s worth 150Bn vs 1Tn).
I think the real risk for the economy, the AI industry, and the US is that Nvidia becomes JUST another company. Nvidia losing 50% of its value from its peak means it’s still a $3 trillion company. What if it loses 90%? Then it’s the size of Intel which we generally agree is an important part of the industry.
Nvidia can afford to invest in companies because the stock is so high and capital is incredibly abundant. Those companies buy Nvidia products at the 50% NET margins. Nvidia gets a ton of cash. Earnings are crazy. But if this cycle stops and efficiency wins in the market (lower margins, more competitors, more options), then Nvidia goes back to where they were which was a Tier-1/2 supplier battling for margin and market share. That is not a $6T company.
What's the downside of that for the economy? It seems like it would be the market becoming more efficient, cutting down on margins and so on. Bringing Nvidia back to earth might open up cheaper hardware for other companies to work with and accelerate AI anyway.
Efficiency is a great thing and long term what’s needed so we can buy laptops again at a reasonable price. There will be a pretty large blast radius across ANT/OAI/ORCL/SPCX/TSMC/neoclouds. Prob 15T of market value at risk and the flywheel of investment which is conditioned on investors and the economy believing they have durable appreciation locked up in AI stocks (“if my basket of investments is safe, I’m willing to invest my next dollar in more of it” vs “the sky is falling and I need to tighten the belt / pull money out”). I’m trying not to be a doomer here as I think it’s somewhere in the middle it’s just very frothy and the upside scenarios generally envisioned NVDA to be stable
I will be honest, my personal opinion is keep the blood flowing until RAM prices return to Sept 2025 levels.
This whole saga has been a ridiculous waste of everybody's time and energy. There's no compelling argument that points to these new innovations not otherwise happening if RAM prices weren't artificially inflated by the fever dream of private equity.
How is nvidia crashing out going to reduce RAM prices?
The demand for high-ram consumption applications is higher than ever and rising. That demand is not created by nvidia, but nvidia's customers. nvidia's customers are buying nvidia parts built with other's ram because they have customers renting the compute.
Whoever nvidia is buying ram from will simply sell to the next highest bidder, and the ram will still be sold out through the coming years.
Because Nvidia is personally investing in a huge amount of those customers, enabling the hyperscaling. If half of the circle breaks, the other half does too.
And those customers still have the demand to keep wanting more.
Contrary to the AI-bubble-doomsayers - most hyperscalers and neoclouds seem to be at capacity for current demand and even have already booked future demand.
> if RAM prices weren't artificially inflated by the fever dream of private equity.
RAM prices are a result of skyrocketing demand. That's hardly a fever dream.
You can hardly blame RAM suppliers for taking the money of people who are coming to them begging to pay more than the person before them in line. It's not like they are squeezing the market in some cartel price-fixing racket.It's the customers who are willing trying to pay more for better access.
The innovations and the price of RAM are so non-sequitur at this point; I can't understand what point you're making. Sure, if RAM were as easy to get as the circuit boards they're being put on, innovation would be the same (or accelerated!) but that doesn't have anything to do with the fact that RAM is incredibly supply constrained and ramping production to meet the demand of a seemingly insatiable market takes a long time for a product this complicated and specialized.
If any of the manufacturing companies could have seen this coming, they'd have started ramping production to insane levels 5 years ago, and they'd be taking in just as much money as Nvidia is.
What in the world does a 20-year-old scheme and prosecution have to do with it?
Besides, when demand outstrips supply you don't have to fix prices. Why would you? They cannot deliver all of the RAM people want. Think about it for a minute: how would price fixing even work?
(and don't get me started on the ridiculous "they're switching from DDR3 to HBM" part of that wikipedia article...)
Companies (CRWV, etc) are borrowing at 10%+ interest rates to buy NVidia GPUs that NVidia makes 75% gross margin on. I repeat, companies are selling junk bonds to buy GPUs at a 300% markup. Cocaine dealers probably don’t even make 75% gross margins.
Other companies (OpenAI, etc) are also borrowing at 10%+ interest to rent the GPUs to train LLMs.
All of these GPUs need a ton of RAM. There is a fixed supply of RAM. There is insane demand for RAM.
RAM prices are not artificially inflated. Everyone wants to run models that require 1TiB of RAM locally. AI agents utilize RAM on every computer more than ever before. The fever dream is imagining these prices are ever coming back down without serious fab investment.
There is blatant and open collusion between everyone that can invest in fabs in order to "slow down" the investment and the supply in order to maintain the prices as high as possible, as long as possible.
"The lawsuit also points towards similar collusion between the companies in the past. In 2005, SK Hynix and Samsung were fined $180 million and $300 million respectively after pleading guilty to price-fixing DRAM pricing. It is suggested that the same occurred between 2016 and 2018 when prices spiked again, ..."
It’s not a given that markets are able to navigate the risk between massive capital investment and unknown future revenues. Everyone is trying to figure out the long term value from AI. For a made up numbers example the path might require $1T investment to unlock $10T revenue in 10 years from now. But if no one can put up the $1T it stalls and doesn’t happen next decade
The hardware is expensive because it's supply constrained. Demand far exceeds supply.
Harming Nvidia would only make us more compute constrained, and raise prices further.
It seems it's impossible to get a certain type of person to understand this regardless of whether it's housing, education or chips.
Harming the producers of [thing] or disincentivizing profits will not make [thing] cheaper if demand remains the same (or if it is growing, like in all of the areas I mentioned).
Doesn't this situation demonstrate how bonkers it is to pin the fortunes of the stock market and potentially the entire economy on the behavior of one person?
Huang has served as CEO for a whopping 33 years - hard to argue he wasn't crucial to NVIDIA's success, and how many of the board members are the original from when he was first chosen-selected and continued to be hired as CEO over the crucial early decades?
What nuanced knowledge-understanding does he have that no one else can have?
Maybe sleeping with spies was a necessary part of survival, perhaps if he wasn't prone to that then he'd have been assassinated and potential replacement CEOs who are toeing certain lines may have been attempted to replace him after his murder?
> Maybe sleeping with spies was a necessary part of survival, perhaps if he wasn't prone to that then he'd have been assassinated and potential replacement CEOs who are toeing certain lines may have been attempted to replace him after his murder?
Respectfully, I don't engage with conspiracy theorists
> Maybe sleeping with spies was a necessary part of survival, perhaps if he wasn't prone to that then he'd have been assassinated and potential replacement CEOs who are toeing certain lines may have been attempted to replace him after his murder?
How do you know it's outlandish? You made a claim but provided no supportive arguments. Is it not a logical conclusion? You do know assassination occurs, right? And if less violent methods don't work then strategy escalates towards eliminating people in positions?
You're really going to need to explain this crazy take. I can't even begin to see the parallels between Jensen Huang being ousted for sleeping with spies and subordinates and the rise of Communism.
they think there are no other hands on leader types. this is fairly normal. just that most of them exit early because its not needed to work all your life if you do this well. early retirement with few million rather than going for billions which is greedy as fk.
Not the fact that he was fired but the reaction of the ideological bent, where statements like "Doesn't this situation demonstrate how bonkers it is to pin the fortunes of the stock market and potentially the entire economy on the behavior of one person?" highlight that's not actually the reality, but this surface shallow narrative is what people are believing - in part driven by fear, but still misunderstanding - and so also prone to false and shallow narratives.
The company should have plans in place for what to do when something happens to the CEO. Situations like this, death, or just deciding to leave. I've read reports that Nvidia didn't have this, which would be irresponsible if true, but it's not the norm. The founder leaving is likely a bit different than some other CEO coming in later, but any good CEO should be thinking about what happens to the company when they're gone so people know the company is still in good hands.
Jensen might be the best person to lead NVidia at the moment, but that doesn't mean that NVidia dominating the market and being able to demand gigantic margins is a good thing for the overall economy.
It should not be a job - that's the whole point. Kings demonstrated how bonkers is having a single point of failure like this so it's insane people still don't get it today.
I really dislike the cult of personality the rich set up around themselves. The entire company is not just one guy. NVIDIA hires a lot of smart and talented people who contributed to its success and many other CEOs would also have been successful given the same parameters.
Right, but then he resigned. So the question on all our minds is if NVIDIA should be entirely written off since losing Jensen's irreplicable talent, or if some of those skills are transferable.
Since he apparently also arranged the company so it revolved around him and no one else was in a central position to know cross silo information, how would those skills transfer?
What skills, specifically? I can't imagine he's the only one who knows how to set up an incomprehensible corporate structure, nor do I think that's what people value about NVIDIA.
I feel like your argument is just "Jensen Huang was Nvidia, and without him the company is doomed", and that's a very strong claim that needs a lot more explanation, because it's certainly not an argument that any shareholder is interested in considering when the company continues to exist, its products remain important and in-demand, and there's a CEO vacancy to fill.
As a shareholder I want a leader who knows how to let other people run the company also, so it doesn’t die with them. (Eventually we’re all headed there, right so…)
You and I and many of the commenters would be on there. People think these CEOs are wizards performing black secret magic we'd fail to understand.
No. They have the same 24 hour day as you and I. They think at the same speed and talk at the same speed. Their "workload" whatever it may be, is finite, evidently finite enough to juggle several romatic relationships at the same time, with much actual work and decisionmaking delegated and informed by domain experts who will be there no matter the CEO.
So yes, you or I could in fact be CEO of NVIDIA. It would be easy. Reports would be made for us by the worlds experts in the fields on what is going on. Departments would be ran by the best available talent on earth. My emails are being read and written by a dozen plus secretaries. Every presser I make I have an ivy league grad writing me the speech making me look like Hemingway out there. Every decision I'd make informed by a team of experts. Every plan thought of already by a hundred people smarter than me. All we'd have to do in the role as NVIDIA CEO is smile, waive, and read the lines handed to us on the sheet of paper by someone else. The ship runs itself even though we all pretend it's the CEO paddling 24/7 making it possible.
Really, that's all any of these guys are doing. Very similar to say the job of a pop star. Are you charismatic? Can you read lines? You'd make a great CEO then.
I cannot and that question is irrelevant to the situation. The dude is going to be getting investigated and spending the next couple of years doing interviews and legal stuff (there's already a securities lawsuit). He literally cannot run the company even if he wanted to. He's also no doubt going to be under congressional and DOJ and Department of Commerce investigation for sanctions violations.
> pin the fortunes of the stock market and potentially the entire economy on the behavior of one person?
"We" don't. Media narratives over-focus on individuals and personalities because that's what humans focus on.
Markets can overreact emotionally on daily headlines and weekly narratives but tend to correct quarter to quarter. There's lots of data and examples: Apple after Jobs, Microsoft after Gates, etc. Even after losing iconic, long-time leaders, most industry-leading companies continue to make even more money, more profitably than ever over the following decade.
I struggle to understand what narrative you're correcting here. "We" in this context seems to collectively mean "humanity". Markets, media narratives, etc. are all run by humans. That's "us", whether or not you personally want any of the blame/credit.
I was disputing that financial markets "pin the fortunes of the stock market and potentially the entire economy on the behavior of one person" at least beyond emotional reactions to daily headlines by retail investors.
I agree that markets shouldn't do that, and further, I believe they don't do that in any meaningful way. NVidia's price drop of ~20% is short-term volatility. Tracked against the NASDAQ, NVidia will likely post new all-time highs within the next 100 days.
That's a fairly hysterical reading. It's a company, no one is irreplaceable.
He has no magic, but he did make some good strategic decisions.
Everyone is a god and a genius (in retrospect) if they found a multi-trillion dollar company, but the causation seldom runs that way.
Jobs founded Apple to great success, left and failed then returned to Apple to great success, then he died and Apple was fine. The company is more important than the individual. Nvidia will also be fine.
And clearly the US economy doesn't rest on the shoulders of Nvidia or AI, no matter the level of hype.
Huang was also well know in industry for awful decisions, which is why most companies that ever worked with Nvidia, worked with them once (with some exceptions tbf).
What on earth are you talking about. The exponential growth in the 1990s, percentage wise, far outpaced the AI bubble. Go look at Intel, Microsoft, lucid, etc from the dot com boom. This is the problem with 20-somethings’ hot takes on the market: no history.
The '90's bubble is what the AI "bubble" would be if everyone you spoke to was glowing with excitement about AI, and a few niche analysts were raising concerns about capex.
Instead this "bubble" is packed with people who detest AI and have extremely bearish views on it's future. If this "bubble" does pop, I think it will be the first one in history that every single person saw coming.
Almost every bubble ever had its detractors. Yet they still happened because those who actually had decision power and market shaping power didn't care about any downsides from popping a larger bubble so they just wanted to make money.
Jensen has created more shareholder value than nearly any human on earth.
A) He never made a single product himself, and B) surely we can see in hindsight that this is a pretty goofy metric for success...? Like, "shareholder value" isn't exactly what we need at this pivotal moment in the terran story.
I think the real risk for the economy, the AI industry, and the US is that Nvidia becomes JUST another company.
...
But if this cycle stops and efficiency wins in the market (lower margins, more competitors, more options), then Nvidia goes back to where they were
Even if we accept capital as the most important thing, this seems pretty openly counterintuitive. You're lamenting the spectre of efficiency.
> B) surely we can see in hindsight that this is a pretty goofy metric for success...? Like, "shareholder value" isn't exactly what we need at this pivotal moment in the terran story.
In the slow evolution of the human race into the Ferengi, it is absolutely a milestone!
Long term we want efficiency. The market is SUPER inefficient right now. People are buying GPUs and stacking them up in warehouses so that they get their allocation. Companies are taking retired jet engines, and turning them into very expensive generators. SoftBank just defaulted on a bunch of power generation orders (increased cost for everyone, but didn’t create the value). My point is that it will be a painful road to get to the efficient market which will likely be a recession because of a massive slow down in spending
A is a reddit meme-argument. It assumes that the labor-theory-of-value is a fact and implies that only fungible IC's add value, whereas irreplaceable great men who organize multi-trillion-dollar companies from scratch contribute nothing. It's a way for them to advance for their silly worldview while obscuring its absurd foundational assumptions.
Your argument sounds like a satire of itself. Surely it's begging the question to say that CEOs are great men who are irreplaceable and individual contributors are fungible.
This is demonstrably untrue. Jensen is an engineer through and through, and contributed significantly to Nvidia's early accelerators: from the NV1, at least to the earliest GeForces.
Ha, I was wondering if someone would bring that up! Pretty funny. How much of the shareholder value of NVidia is represented by his share of the NV1 and the earliest GeForces?
not necessarily. One athlete's performance can be the difference between a team winning and losing. One general can make the difference between winning and losing a war. No risk also comes with the downside of no reward, artificially constraining high achievers so we dont become too reliant on them just means everyone is equally low achieving
Totally agree. And that's late-stage capitalism for you. For a site named "hacker news" the hacker spirit is noticeably absent here. Instead you have simps for billionaires.
The thing to remember every time you see the orange, so you don't forget, is that you are posting on the promotional website of a multibillion-dollar private equity firm.
This is of course true that YC provides this platform but, tapping in to my religious upbringing, it's a bit like confusing a church for the building it's in. Ycombinator owns the building that the community meets in, but the community is bigger than the landlord. The landlord can set some rules and influence what happens in the building, but if they impose too much on the community it will find a different building to meet in.
If you think that the values of a church have nothing to do with the discussions that happen inside of the church, I'm not sure what to tell you. If you believe the opposite, that's exactly the same point that I was just making.
I think we almost certainly agree at least about the nature of YC, but I didn't make my point clearly. A church is a community that meets in a building; the building the community meets in is not the church. Many smaller churches meet in neighborhood centers that are state-owned, if the state imposed a no prayer rule on meetings in the neighborhood center, I suspect the community would find a new building to meet in.
By analogy: the amoral VC nitwits that own the HN servers could try to enforce their values on the discussions here, but doing so with a heavy hand would quickly drive the true 'hacker' community elsewhere. Dang has a very light hand, especially when it comes to topics around YC that get discussed here.
Sure, there are no shortage of bootlicking CEO cargo cultists here looking for the right turtleneck/leather jacket combo to ascend to their rightful place at the top of the pile with PG and Sama... And being associated with the HN community's ethos certainly gives an undeserved glow to YC, which like all VC accelerators really is just a predatory tool of the wealthy investor class to maintain control of capital (a poor kid that grows up and founds a company that creates a ton of wealth could have dangerous ideas, best to capture them early and give them an approved board and structures to constrain them...)
That said, I frequently come across things here that subvert the platform's owners. For example, I think pretty much every member of my anti-VC founder alliance [0] found it through my own comments here. I get personal joy from promoting that here, subverting YC's own platform to challenge their golden goose.
So yes, know who's house this is, but stay aware of who has the power (us).
If anything Jensen Huang is the exact embodiment of the hacker spirit. An engineer who singlehandedly created one of the most valuable companies on earth by creating the chips that AI runs on.
I dont get how you can talk about the "hacker spirit" but then talk about "late-stage capitalism" (essentially the flat-earthism of economy) and tech founders.
3 employees. That was 33 years ago. If you seriously think he is solely responsible for nvidia’s success I am willing to bet that you also voted for Trump.
> I dont get how you can talk about the "hacker spirit" but then talk about "late-stage capitalism" (essentially the flat-earthism of economy) and tech founders.
Can you elaborate on why you think not a single aspect of late stage capitalism is true in any capacity, like flat-earthism?
Par for the course on HN, unfortunately. I once thought the stereotypes about "tech bros" were overblown, but HN users seem dedicated to proving them right. Something's gone wrong if you're making comments complaining about how ethics don't matter at all in life and money is the only thing to ever be considered.
My “history of technology 101” course was pretty clear that this title lies with the invention of the bowl. Be that pottery or wood. Something to store excess food in for tomorrow.
Nvidia stock price is now lower than it was a year ago. Has been declining for about 6 months, highly volatile, with a step sell off starting a month ago.
Cisco's stock price was similarly very high during the dotcom boom, but then collapsed, and took 17 years to build back up.
The thing people keep forgetting is nvidia makes graphics cards. Not CPUs, not a range of different products. Graphics cards. With a software moat. Their only business advantage is that people currently want a lot of their graphics cards and are currently dependent on their software. All that can be competed against. China is already putting out their own cards. Google has TPUs. AMD makes both CPUs and GPUs. The memory prices will soon fall as more capacity comes online.
It's practically a certainty that this stock price will keep falling. They're valuable, but in a competitive market, likely not 10x more valuable than their $17 stock price in 2022. When they fall harder so will the AI economy.
the stock value just represents what people think the company is (or will be) worth, them selling products at 50% margin is what brings the money, the stock value doesn't give NVIDIA extra cash (unless they're selling or leveraging their own stock reserves to get even more cash?). And definitely shareholder value is not the economy.
and also, how is the efficiency bad now? surely that allows for innovation and other companies and people to get cheaper hardware (assuming they somehow have to lower their margins because Jensen left, still don't get that argument)
> Jensen has created more shareholder value than nearly any human on earth.
Nonsense. Nvidia's employees created that value, not Jensen. Jensen personally is all but certainly responsible for almost none of the value created, just like in every other company. CEO worship is absurd.
Like it's an extremely common sentiment when working for a large company to look at the SVP or CEO and go "that person is a dumbass, everyone in charge is a dumbass". Yet when looking at other companies somehow we forget about that and put the companies success on the CEO or top level execs. Instead of remembering "no, it's probably the small army below them figuring out how to manage upwards to prevent the idiot in charge from tanking everything"
They should fall first to AI replacement as they're the least useful people in a company and most susceptible to ruining the company's reputation by screwing a Chinese spy and a hot local chic.
Tell me you know nothing about running a company without telling me. Just because one CEO got caught screwing over a Chinese spy that doesn't mean all CEOs are useless people. That's just lazy generalization.
If the origin of the people who created value is the metric, aren't his parents and ancestors those who truly are responsible for creating all that shareholder value?
I prefer the view that the engineers that made GPUs have a bigger hand in the value creation.
> Those employees didn’t create it when a huge number of them worked at AMD, Apple, Qualcomm, Intel, or TI.
I agree: we must do everything we possibly can to aggrandize the already wealthy and powerful. The glory must accumulate in their account, and the less that goes to their subordinates, the better.
I mean Jensen even said that he does not mind the California billionaire* tax. To believe that CEOs and Founders are not replaceable is hyperbole but so is to believe that they are totally replaceable. NVIDIA clearly has a moat and are the belle of the ball, of the world economy
You can’t convince these people. A large portion of the population is hardwired (by DNA) to be subordinate and hierarchical, for better or worse. Probably best to simply let them believe in Superheroes.
This tendency to credit an entire technological breakthrough to the top of an org chart is such a bizarre cliche from a systems perspective. Breakthroughs are not conceived from whole cloth within the corner offices of isolated autocracies; they are the product of horizontal networks of social capital as engineers continually circulate across firms.
Besides, individual contributors aren't incentivized to innovate insofar as we're not structurally positioned to capture a windfall.
I recognize the narrative that an army of world-class engineers is essentially inert until an executive visionary breathes purpose into them, but that's a structural property of the firm. It's a choice to route all surplus through the board and major shareholders, and to starve out any innovation that happens outside of those venues.
This sort of empty bitterness is a very pernicious thing. It reads as knowledge / experience, but really it’s nothing more than angry drivel. It doesn’t say anything that hasn’t been said before a million times.
> Jensen personally is all but certainly responsible for almost none of the value created
That's a very limited view of value creation. Have you ever lead a team of people? Coached someone? Raised a child? Written a technical architecture?
A lot of people play crucial roles in a company. HR, accounting, leadership, PM's, engineers, support, etc. All of them contribute to the value creation.
If you've ever been in a company with poor leadership and one with great leadership, you'd see the impact of it on everyone working there and on the value being created.
> That's a very limited view of value creation. Have you ever lead a team of people? Coached someone? Raised a child? Written a technical architecture?
Yup, all of it. And at no point have I considered myself as 10,000x more valuable than any of the team members I led. Yet that's exactly what is done to billionaire CEOs.
You'll notice I did not say Jensen didn't create ANY value.
Sorry, what hard decisions did Jensen make, exactly? "Hey team, I'm going to make the tough decision here to propose that next year's GPU is faster than last years"?
Do you know for sure that Jensen personally was involved in recruiting Ian Buck and starting up the CUDA project? A project that's largely attributed to John Nickolls? What other major decisions did Nvidia even make over the last, say, 15 years?
The decision to support CUDA and include it in retail GPUs so that he could create a massive installed base, even in the face of criticism and loss of stock value, for years. Sort of like Tesla building superchargers to cause BEVs to become viable.
This is hilarious because Jensen’s idea of leadership is petty authoritarianism. I’m not sure if this is just HN being emotionally bought in to great man theory or financially bought in to NVDA, but most of their value creation is on the back of gamer chips being useful for crypto and later AI.
>> Jensen personally is all but certainly responsible for almost none of the value created
>That's a very limited view of value creation. Have you ever lead a team of people? Coached someone? Raised a child? Written a technical architecture?
I can assure you that the people you are targeting the question at, have never/rarely done any of the things you asked. I call them the socialists. They sit in judgment of people who do things while they lead their petty lives and all they look forward is the next Superbowl game, or next Netflix series.
(p.s you might like the writings of author by name Ayn Rand, Disclaimer: I'm no worshiper of Rand)
I agree that CEO worship is absurd but it’s a big stretch to say they are responsible for none of the value. Jensen AND the employees. And he probably created a disproportionate amount of that value compared to the average IC, I don’t think that’s in question. But is he responsible for most of it, or even 10% of it? Unlikely.
You're right, it takes a company to deliver a value. With that said, you are *seriously* underestimating how hard it is to organize and run a large company. Jensen is not perfect by any means, and I don't even particularly like him. I just hate this anti-billionaire narrative being thrown around a lot lately that leaders don't matter.
This could've been said of Cisco in the telecom bubble days. Or Nortel. Or a handful of other key players who were all inflating that bubble and playing games with their financials that made the bursting of the bubble worse.
Pumping billions of dollars, the source of which is obscured, into it looks like a cut out, is not just a national security problem. It undermines confidence in the numbers that you claim are the basis of shareholder value.
That's incredibly unlikely. NVidia and Megaspeed's relationship has been under constant separate parallel investigations by the Justice and Commerce Depts going back to the Biden administration. There have been no charges and Megaspeed was never even added to the blocked Entities List which would instantly ban all sales, despite the US govt being free to do so at any time with no justification or explanation needed.
It appears two things are simultaneously true:
- Thousands of banned GPUs were diverted to China.
- NVidia meticulously verified export licenses and complied with every U.S. law, export control and KYC regulation.
The under-reported fact is that while the US Govt chose not to add Megaspeed to the banned list, NVidia voluntarily placed Megaspeed on their own blocklist and stopped selling GPUs to them in June 2025. This was because the law requires NVidia to block any company they "know or reasonably suspect" is violating export controls. There is an extensive framework of Red Flags a supplier is required to check and certify are 'cleared'. The penalties for failing to do so are the same as violating export controls on cruise missiles (up to 20 years in jail, $1M per GPU ). And they can apply personally to each employee who knew. So, NVidia cut off one of their largest South Asian customers ~18 months ago, despite Jensen banging the customer's board member.
No, I can't explain it either. But those are the facts per WSJ & NYT reporting. The meta-subtext here is there have been two opposing factions on China policy inside the White House, NSC, and U.S. intelligence community since the Biden era. They are each constantly trying to sway Trump, who vacillates between them (as seen by inconsistent US policy swings). One of those factions leaked the 6 month-old Alice story a week ago in the hope of blocking Jensen's influence and access to Trump. It worked (probably better than expected). Now that Jensen is both out of NVidia and politically toxic, neither faction cares about him.
If efficiency is a risk for the economy then the economy is of course. Hopefully the correction can be soft and not a catastrophic pop. Maybe a slight cooling of Nvidia, caused by isolated factors, can help without crashing the whole sector.
I'm a normal person with a beating heart and conscience, so I don't give a damn about how much shareholder value someone has ever created, and I never will.
So you are not planning to ever retire? You never buy anything? You dont have a job?
Unless you are a subsistence farmer, everything you have in your life is thanks to the economy and "shareholder value".
Its strange to me how many people will say stuff like "who cares about the economy, I care about people" when the economy is the thing that ensures people have food and shelter and dont starve.
>> everything you have in your life is thanks to the economy and "shareholder value".
No it's not, shareholder value as understood as owning a piece of a publicly traded company doesn't produce anything on its own and it's definitely independent of the economy of a society. Could even be argued that the wealth stuck in the shareholder value is reducing the investments that could be being made in the interest of the rest of the economy.
I can easily make something and sell it to you without creating shareholder value.
Huh? Who's talking about that? OP argued that everything we have is because of shareholder value. That is false.
No one is talking about anything being easy or redefining a market (which, since you bring it up, has been done infinite times by private and state funded companies as well)
It's just that "Jensen has created more shareholder value than nearly any human on earth", to many people, sounds a bit like "McDonalds has created more calories than nearly every company on earth". Sure, you need calories to survive, but that's not exactly the issue people are having here.
Counter-hypothesis: It wouldn’t be that deep, but it would fix inflationary pressures pretty quickly especially for assets.
Also you act like those bets were group / government decisions. They weren’t my bets. They were NVIDIA’s bets. Equity holders should lose value if the bet fails - that will not be most of the economy by a long shot. The stock market is not the economy. The Casino should not have existed in the first place at the scale it did. This is the correction everyone has been talking about when discussing “bubbles”
Giving Jensen credit for creating literally all of the value from Nvidia seems really over the top. He happened to be running the biggest GPU company during the biggest GPU boom ever. Sure he had an impact on the numbers and the timing, but if Jensen had never been born someone else would be heading a giant chip company around this period of time that saw it's stock take off like a rocket ship. This would happen even if the counterfactual CEO was incompetent.
Can you please make your substantive points without swipes? Your comment would be fine without the "Bruh", "You are making it sound as if", and "This is ridiculous" bits.
Isn't he the entire reason Nvidia invested so heavily in tensor cores before AI even became a massive market mover? He definitely deserves credit for setting Nvidia up with a massive lead in this emergent industry.
I feel like it's worth repeating that he gets credit for the decisions he has made, while it's also true that someone else would also see this demand, maybe earlier maybe later, and that the economy and shareholders would benefit. The point I'm making, and I think the one you're responding to, is that he didnt do something so magical that wouldn't have been done otherwise. It's a counterpoint to "this guy did so much, we would be nothing without him" and using that as a way to excuse his bad decisions.
Again, credit for putting yourself in the position to capitalize. Credit for executing. But it's pretty likely that the world would not be substantially different if Nvidia has been another company and Jensen was some guy working at MS.
I think the Tensor decision was very impactful to both the direction of AI tech and Nvidia as a company, though. I can't judge how much of the decision to invest in that technology was his but assuming he had a significant proportion of influence in that decision, he deserves a significant portion of the credit. A different person in the same position might not have seen the potential of machine learning at scale and not been willing to point their GPUs at the problem.
They basically invested in pickaxes a decade before the gold rush, and people only found out about the gold because pickaxes were pretty convenient
Not really. Nvidias gpu architecture was tensor.. It is useful for other things like AI. That wasn't a decision to create AI other than it was what they had. They landed on their feet. They didn't invest in pickaxes, they had the right pickaxe at the right time.
Revisionist nonsense. Turing introduced tensor cores which were largely useless on launch, but massively increased transistor count and die size. It was entirely a bet on future and emerging applications.
It isn't like he is the one who did the research to lead to that decision though. That just isn't his job. He isn't an analyst. He is CEO, who reads reports or sat in presentations made by his analysts, whatever their specific position titles, who are really the ones who did the work weighing and making this decision. His role was to say yes to these people whose job it is to actually figure this out.
So indeed, if he was not CEO, likely whoever would have been would be given the same information as Jensen that lead to him saying yes on tensor cores. And in all likelihood, the same exact decision would have been made, or at least a coinflips odds chance if it really were a matter of "yes" or "no" with no clear winner.
My experience in corporate America is that, no - it would NOT be likely that a different CEO makes the same call.
Many, especially the "non-founder" CEOs, are risk-averse.
There's likely many CUDA-like ideas from internal engineers shot-down or ignored by leadership at companies like Microsoft, Google, etc.
While Tim Cook certainly drove the valuation of Apple up during his tenure, one of the most common criticisms was that Apple stopped innovating and more recently their quality bar has been dropping.
Sounds like a perfect fix for inflationary pressures to be honest - at least when it comes to assets and equities. Takes trillions off the board, stops the money machine cycle, and only impacts equity holders. Probably missing something here but that seems about right to me.
It would be a great thing for the economy. So many sectors are underinvested right now because capital has been stowed away into these companies valuations. Imagine 6T dumped in any other industry and it would be a generational step change event. For reference that's ballpark like 3x the valuation of the entire American biotechnology industry, all in one company. Talk about opportunity cost.
Does it work like that though? I agree that AI may be crowding out other industries, but I'm not sure you can just take apart a company and redistribute that money elsewhere.
No, it isn't measuring the velocity of incoming investment. But it goes to show just how outstandingly large the pile of money on one ticker in particular is, relative to other high tech industries that are even favored by investors for their 10x potential (maybe moreso historically than today albeit).
Company valuations aren't a sum of the cash flows invested into a company or the available cash flows out of liquidating it either. These aren't uncorrelated numbers but you can technically get a six trillion dollar "valuation" from one person paying $1 for a sixth of a trillionth of a company.
No they aren't, but it is an example of relative scale of investment. Especially when much of that market cap growth has come just within the last 5-6 years or so. Money could have flowed to other ponds collecting off the river of investor cash flow instead of this one massive lake. This might have lead to a different growth trajectory in our economy and technological development than one so focused on the ROI of chip production in particular, to the exclusion of much else. The fact that much of that demand is brought up by circular investment is another aspect. Two lakes backfeeding into eachother eating more and more of the flow off cash flow river, drying up other ponds along the way. Much is lost with such unitary focus of investment.
I would go a little bit further and just say that American workers haven’t been the main beneficiaries of investment for at least a decade now. It “used to be” (some rose tinted glasses but still big kernel of truth) that if a company was making a lot of money or sitting on a big cash war chest, eventually it would make its way back to the employees for expansion, R&D, etc. It would be used for something! But ever since companies started to divert those flows to stock buybacks (and now, the equivalent which seems to be mutual stock purchases) less and less of those profits have been functionally reinvested - the reinvestment mostly happens on paper, and the already-wealthy owners of the stocks get wealthier without expanding the stockholder base as much.
Suppose NVIDIA ceased to exist today. What would happen? AMD would step in. Huawei would step in. Maybe even Intel eventually. More fab capacity would go to these companies accelerators.
At worse, progress stalls for a year or two.
NVIDIA was at the lead and took most of the revenue and valuation because of it. But the same process would have happened with or without NVIDIA.
Now go back five years and substitute an NVIDIA collapse. Do you think that we'd be in a very different position for AI? I don't think it would be far off at all.
There were many game accelerator companies when NVIDIA started, they were just slightly better than the others, and the efficiency gains of consolidation resulted in those other companies being sold off.
ASML is definitely a one off though. And perhaps TSMC is a unique one off, but they got there by taking the most customers. If it wasn't them, then somebody else would have done it.
The key selection function was "this is the best option at the time" and if the best option hasn't existed, somebody else would have been chosen path that time, giving that other company the capital to build somethjng.
In addition to all that, other investments would be made in other sectors. I'm sure a huge bulk of investment into NVDA in particular is strictly because of the five figure percentage growth it has enjoyed over the last 6 years after all, with the whole chip argument being the fig leaf over the rampant greedy pumping. It has exploded like some lucky shitcoin and that's enough to drive investor action on massive scale after all. We are in the world where shitcoins are listed along with the blue chip tickers on bloomberg news. Everyone is greedy right now. Gambling on every scale from every direction. Most corrupt president in history to boot openly insider trading; water is full of chum and blood right now.
In part, because money is going to these other ventures instead. Where would money go if there weren't an NVDA is the 6T question. What would this world look like with more balanced investment across the SP500 sectors instead of money dumped into this one industry in particular? I don't think it would be more chip companies on a 1:1 basis of NVDA investment. The fact that it is going to a single ticker in this case makes it more likely to suck the other options out of existence. If it were say 100 chip companies, more likely on an individual level than an investor might instead say, maybe this time I would invest in some other industry. Mutual funds that investors buy into to hedge into many sectors are also heavier than ever in tech companies like NVDA sort of perverting the whole concept of these funds in the first place. Sort of unprecedented times between how overlevereged things are, and the constant uninformed pumping of air into these stocks thanks to these packages such as these mutual funds that people automatically contribute their paycheck into, again believing they are probably getting much more broad exposure vs how leveraged these packages are currently.
Nvidia losing 50% of its value from its peak means it’s still a $3 trillion company. What if it loses 90%? Then it’s the size of Intel which we generally agree is an important part of the industry.
This seems correct because of the proportions, but a company that's valued at say 600 million isn't the same as a company coming from being valued at 6 trillion and landing on 10% of its value, because of the direction of the valuation. While the former is at 600 million ascending, the later is in a descending trend, which affects trust and momentum.
Jensen created some shareholder value, but in reality it's the AI labs (and crypto before that) that led to the huge valuation. None of this is his making, he just got lucky.
Any other idiot in his place would have made the same amount of money.
I guess everyone looks at infidelity and goes oh the horror. Thing is these are puritanical views and has no bearing on the companys wider performance. Not to mention the fact we dont really know what was going on with these people's personal lives. Now going around sanctions otoh is a whole different problem. Although tbf, given the clown that is the US president right now, I am not sure the US has the moral high ground to suggest selling to China is a problem or anything. I dont see the point of these sanctions, so I understand if Nvidia found a way of going around the sanctioned pathways.
Now I'm in danger of sounding like a conspiracy theorist, but I think there are several layers to this current drama. Most of the reporting is very "surface level". I also don't pretend to have the full picture myself, but there are many players and many agendas at play, and those agendas can change over time.
[edited for typo]
Jensen, even after decades, remained deeply involved in many operational decisions with 40+ direct reports. He had a long-term mindset, investing heavily in Tegra and CUDA in 2009-2010, even as he was plagued by write-offs from faulty chips.
This is a terrible decision for NVIDIA and the broader economy.
does that imply OP is right that Huang is the best person to lead the company and efforts to pressure him to step down are just people trying to cancel him over his sexual escapades? Otherwise what is "spoken like a true shareholder" supposed to mean?
Someone with an actual long term mindset wouldn't have slept with a suspected PRC spy, while simultaneously flouting the intent of export control laws, and setting his company up for federal smuggling probes, and congressional investigations.
Someone with an actual long term mindset and who had the interests of the company would have groomed one or more successors, and, if, for some reason, they felt they were indispensable, would have probably avoided jeopardizing the company by allegedly having an affair with a subordinate.
There are plenty of people in the world to sleep with besides subordinates and spies. Failing the most basic of marshmallow tests is not a indication of a consistent long-term mindset.
Jensen is a colorful, important figure in the history of technology. He did make many solid long term bets. But if the company falls apart because of his reckless actions, that that's on him too.
And if it doesn't fall apart, then the credit goes to him for resigning.
To go full devils avocado: Surely a CEO selling more chips isn't a bad thing for his company?
All I've seen is his personal relationships drama and advocating for softening of useless export laws that didn't stop a single CPU or GPU get into China in the first place, selling to Megaspeed is hardly anything unlike what AMD or other suppliers does right now.
It's a hitjob and he probably could have fought it but chose not to.
Much like the broken unenforced rules that lets OpenAI/ycombinator sell trillions upon trillions of tokens into China each week despite all the export restriction laws against them doing it.
You really think the Chinese can't pay and access ChatGPT/Anthropic/Google premium models today?
Where do you think that someone who is surrounded by bodyguards, always traveling, and working 7 days a week is going to meet someone normal?
I’m not even a billionaire, but the only people I interact with are people who I work with or who insert themselves into my life because they want something.
He wanted to have the cake and to eat it at the same time. I've seen CEO's who handled this in a much more orderly way, such as: getting a divorce, then announcing internally to the company that he is getting a divorce, then announcing he has found new love with a certain person at the company and in the same sentence announcing that the certain person effectively no longer answers to him, but to the board or something like that.
Still icky, but this person still enjoys success as a CEO of their company. Huang not anymore.
This might be due to violations or breach of his duties as the CEO, especially given the nature of who the other party has loyalties too, but nonetheless, its a lesson for us all. Because even if he didn't directly provide any IP, would that party have reasonable access to any IP during the events. Guess only time will tell
The board, made of 10 members, only has 3.94% of Nvidia share in total, out of which 3.58% is owned by Huang.
Meaning that the 9 people pushing him out add up to own 0.36% of Nvidia share, only 0.36%
This is betray of shareholder interest. The board doesn't own Nvidia, this is not their business, yet only they can vote. they just want to finish as soon as possible, and you get a mad result.
Eh, i think he's acting as a heatshield for Nvidia, his affairs are irrelevant, but the Chinese sales could put both Nvidia as a company and him as CEO in jail... this allows them both to pretends it's a 'personal issue' and get away with it.
That bit with Dwarkesh was very prophetic in hindsight.
Would make 0 sense for several reasons. Very gullible thing to take anything seriously Musk spouts out. So strange that there is basically a fantasy world out there for Musk fanboys.
What I think is hard to argue: Jensen did a remarkable job leading his company, especially during the development of CUDA, which required an enormous investment in the 2000s but eventually created an ecosystem that outside developers and companies now help sustain and expand. CUDA is a major reason Nvidia has such a dominant market position and should continue to achieve far into the future, regardless of who is CEO. Nvidia's massive risk and its extraordinary payoff will likely be studied for a long time.
AI pushed Jensen into the spotlight very quickly and he didn't respond well, but he should go down in history as an extraordinary leader.
Regardless of the implications, even just as a change for NVIDIA this will be one of the moments we look back on. Keep hands and arms inside the vehicle at all times!
Jensen, even after decades, remained deeply involved in many operational decisions with 40+ direct reports. He had a long-term mindset, investing heavily in Tegra and CUDA in 2009-2010, even as he was plagued by write-offs from faulty chips.
This is a terrible decision for NVIDIA and the broader economy. Jensen gets to retire with $100B+ and not deal with the crap.
Thousands and thousands of employees played a more direct role. And in fact, many would've done things different, like not violating export controls and having affairs with reports. Don't simp for a CEO, you're weird
> He had a long-term mindset, investing heavily in Tegra and CUDA in 2009-2010, even as he was plagued by write-offs from faulty chips.
He didn't seem to have a long-term mindset when he knowingly violated export control laws (the feds are, in general, super serious about export controls) and securities laws (the feds are also, in general, super serious about whatever they consider securities fraud) over the course of at least the last six months.
It's frustrating because it was so easily avoidable. Just don't do crimes with nation-states.
He should be thankful he's not in prison. Even without the spy and affair scandals, his lobbying to sell chips to China is treasonous due to how geopolitically critical AI will soon become. (That alone is not criminally treasonous, but with the MSS influence operation, it might be.) He should've resigned days ago.
I'm no pro-US nationalist or anything, but I am very very much anti-CCP.
By the way, do we actually know if Alice Huang is actually Chinese spy, or just merely sees good money in reselling NVIDIA chips to them? Because you don't really need to be the former to do the latter.
> He should be thankful he's not in prison. Even without the spy and affair scandals, his lobbying to sell chips to China is treasonous due to how geopolitically critical AI will soon become. (That alone is not criminally treasonous,
He should be thankful he's not jailed for advocating something which is not even declared illegal yet? Is that the famous "rule of the law" I heard so much about?
> Is that the famous "rule of the law" I heard so much about?
We're in the find-out phase of the merger of the corporation and the state, where everything is permitted as long as you send some considerations to the dear leader...
The jail part is assuming the woman is in fact a spy and did in fact influence him to do this. Neither are proven.
The other part is me subjectively calling him treasonous, unrelatedly; not in a criminal way.
I should've said "depending on the results of the investigation, he may end up just being thankful he won't get a prison sentence". (Or maybe he will get a prison sentence, depending on what the investigation finds. We'll see.)
Him doing that is not criminally treasonous (although if influenced by a spy there might be some sort of crime; if he knew she was a spy then it might be criminally treasonous). I say it solely in non-legal, subjective, moral terms.
Did he? A singular CEO with 40+ direct reports and no succession plan... that alone feels like a very short term mindset to me. He could have been hit by a car tomorrow, what's the contingency plan there? Not to mention the whole 'violating export restrictions' thing, that's typically not great for the long term viability of a company either.
Not sure it’s as much “short term mindset” as it is power consolidation. He doesn’t own a big voting share (only 3.5%) or a special share class like Zuck, so it’s in his interest to not have a clear #2 lest they and the board get any ideas of collaborating on a coup.
He spent a decade supporting CUDA despite much criticism and share price losses only to ultimately be proven right. If that isn’t a long term bet, what is?
Without naming names, as that would be too identifying, the issue there is actually that Jensen was a bad and weak manager. Part of the reason for his accumulation of direct reports was not straightening out interpersonal issues amongst his reports - he has multiple sets of multiple reports each where they would naturally have a single owner but because they hate each other he couldn't have any of them report to any of the others (looking at you, Mellanox). This is a basic failure of managerial skill.
Jansen was once an engineer and a solid evangelist, but he doesn't really appear to have any skill at managing people.
I doubt there is anyone close to his caliber that he can be replaced with. Engineers with strong leadership skills are hard to come by. Airhead CEO's with no clue when it comes to engineering are easy.
Case in point: The new interim Colette Kress is a finance MBA. China is laughing at us right now. Many engineers at Nvidia are looking at the exit.
The spy affair was probably going to sink him eventually because she was also tied to a company that was redirecting chips to China where NVidia is banned from selling chips above a certain capability. Another affair came out this time with a subordinate inside the company which is also something that CEOs normally don't survive, the combo of them helped hammer in the nearly inevitable conclusion of each of them.
The affairs are horrible behavior. Going around export restrictions.
But talk about ruining a legacy before it really took off. I don't really have sympathy. But this guy should have carried around a piece of paper with some short aphorisms to look at everyday to anchor him back to reality.
Jensen's the most pro-open weight guy and calmest on China public figure at that level.
Musk has done, and continues to do, the most horrific stuff, including things far more questionable from a US security perspective. Altman's reputation is not one of honesty and fair dealing. We've had very clear evidence of Microsoft's leadership being caught in honey-traps by foreign governments. No heads rolled.
The difference between Musk and Huang is that Musk has engineered such control of his companies through dual class listings that there really is no one who can fire him. Having said that, people are very openly talking about the fact that Musk is going to spend the next couple of years spending quality time with the US congress explaining in minute detail why he's not a traitor.
The other big difference between the two is that after the last election, Musk (with Trumps help) essentially put himself in a position where he basically controlled the federal government for 6 months and did whatever he wanted with no consequences. It's a lot easier to commit crimes when you fire all the people who are trying to stop you..
That's why they should all stay. And ideally export the corruption and stupid business culture to China so they get hit too. I want a world that's not dominated by one or two powerful countries.
Yep. More accurately, Amodei’s wife wanted to be connected to Epstein (after he had pled guilty) - but he turned her down!
> An earlier venture, adult-film company Eddice, drew Clark into contact with Jeffrey Epstein. In 2011, she emailed Epstein a film script seeking investment, according to documents released by the Department of Justice in 2026. "We thought you and the ladies might enjoy," she wrote. Epstein did not invest.
Big CEO has affair, even with the intelligence angle, is pretty routine kompromat fodder.
The normal pathway would be that this would be disclosed to said horny capitalist via state security, with the understanding that they'll behave in certain circumstances and that it will be ensured that things go no further. This is a win for Uncle Sam.
That this didn't happen is telling. Obviously, cui bono gives quite a long list, but the state would have needed to be on side.
1. China, to take down one of the keys to Nvidia's success and potentially sabotage US dominance in AI and hardware, right as they've started their own.
2. The US gov, who may have been worried about Jensen's "loyalty".
3. The US gov, who were previously skimming money off of illegal sales but now need to do performative justice to prevent themselves from being held accountable after the change in governance last week.
4. A coordination between the US gov and AI firms, who may not have appreciated Jensen's open-ness toward open models and likely refusal to install firmware-level blocks for "unapproved" models.
The term "performative justice" seems to be a theme, and reminds me of "Hegseth awards medal to soldier who reprimanded him and aides at Arlington Cemetery."
Hmmm I don't know like limiting Starlink on Urkainian drones? Like repeatedly meeting with Putin and failing to disclose it? Failure to report foreign contracts? The fact that he was denied Special Access Program clearance (we don't know why)? The fact that he has over $1B in loans from state controlled Chinese banks? Campaigning on behalf of the far right AFD party in Germany?
The drone thing is uninteresting. But the others I haven't heard about. Do you have reliable sources for these? The problem with anti-Musk stuff is that 99% of the time it is overblown sniping from media hungry blowhards or oil industry lobbyists, and has been since 2012 when he launched the Model S at Tesla. But, I'm open to considering real problems. His time at DOGE was definitely dodgy (but the falling out between Trump and Musk was epic cinema.)
The others do not have a board capable of outing them. It has, in fact, been tried and discussed at length.
It's not a conspiracy, this is what happens when you don't give one person total control through manipulating the board and stock. You fuck up and get the axe.
Yeup. Didn't want to go into all of it, but that's basically what I was referring to.
This is, in theory, feature not a bug territory. Your CEO did something they shouldn't of (allegedly). The board now fires them rather than having the stock and the company ride or die based on it.
Will the short term stock suffer, sure. Will the company do better for it, maybe/maybe not? I don't totally agree with one great man but I get the idea and once you start working at a certain level you do see products often as a reflection of the values of the top of the chain.
Either way, there's no doubt this is a complicated and "unique" circumstance given the behavior of the US government, and I wouldn't be totally shocked if he DID knowingly break the law and did so with the help of the POTUS, and that's an entire quagmire.
The board/company distancing itself from that makes sense, and bluntly, it's not like jensen staying on was going to save the stock or AI. This is a symptom of what's going on not the cause, and him somehow not being voted out likely changes nothing, even for the board or NVIDIA who are all going to have uncomfortable questions about behavior and decisions even with Jensen out the door. Hell it might be the best place for him.
> Tin foil hat take: I think Jensen's been sniped.
I think this statement has a real risk of turning into a motte and bailey argument.
If you are only alleging that people are gunning for him, that’s true for every CEO and powerful person on the planet. People have things to gain from exploiting their positions.
The specific truths about anything hardly matter when a story becomes this big. The hubbub is too much of a distraction and Jensen was going to get hauled in front of Congress by reps trying to score points with anti-AI constituents.
Despite his personal affairs, he brought significant growth and stability to NVIDIA thanks to which we all have access to excellent products so his dismissal does not seem like a wise decision. I wonder if his successor will be able to measure up to him. And what would be the cost for nvidia?
It all seems political and every politician has an affair to hide...
I really hope the NVIDIA GeForce Now service sticks around and doesn't get enshittified.
It's actually an excellent high quality service and with all the shortages should hopefully continue to get more and more successful. Cloud gaming will continue to become a more important part of gaming.
Now that Microsoft recently enshittified Xbox Cloud Gaming, we have a situation where GeForce Now is pretty much the only good option left.
I only wish he got ousted for being a liar about where the money was coming from during the crypto boom, or the super anti consumer policies like prohibiting OEMs from having a top of the line series with anything other than nvidia, refusing for years to support standard vrr and pushing for g-sync, artificially nerfing silicon capabilities in consumer grade dies and helping this bubble get bigger and bigger with bad accounting practices.
The dude is out at the absolute top of the company because he fucked too many women he shouldn't have and in a year people will be missing him when the AI reckoning for hardware manufacturers comes.
Edit: and hairworks! That fucking shit that tanked performance but was "a game changer" due to PR. Just like the fake frames and slop filter they're pushing now.
Apologies, but I don't really get why these issues are being exposed all over so awfully about the person life of the poor person who is getting ashamed, reputation getting damaged, and what's more important, his wonderful personal, private life is getting exposed and preserved in the history...
These lovely cases must still be approached with pure respect for private life of everyone, and understanding, because we all are human who have feelings, and this is absolutely normal to make mistakes in love sometimes trying...
Relationships, affairs, love... this is personal and must be respected. These are some of the most complex subjects, if not the most... and infinitely magnificent feelings... where sometimes the heart and hope wins over rational actions...
Yet, this is true for every single human, isn't it? This is true about me, I believe, too. This is true about people I know in overly serious and responsible positions at critical decisions for business and lives of other people... and they know that, and stay careful.
And these cases, vulnerabilities, or operational risks... are also covered on military classes, as leadership and security awareness courses, to stay responsible for actions and consider the future - to remind that you must always evaluate the long term consequences, to the point to decide quickly in full action.
This is matter of the heart... human emotions... infinitely powerful aspects of human nature... the dear love...
There's nothing to be ashamed of.
Yes, you must stay truthful to your half... the ring bound promise, which is a miracle if from love...
But it is fundamentally... absolutely normal, awesome to try searching for your soulmate if you don't have peace at heart, making mistakes, trying hard...
// ---
Such public cases are either designed for public (e.g., to derail attention from something more important), or those that get out of control, which is relatively rare, I believe.
It is rare to get exposed on public since these relationships are known to limited number of people, aren't they? So samizdat is rarely responsible for it, and mass publishers are normally supervised by governments, which is expected for them to stay responsible for control of events.
Even if circumstances and consequences may be monumentally tragic or overly serious, this is love which is no less serious, and miraculously lovely awesome...
// ---
> I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry...
>
> To my wife and family: I love you. I know an apology cannot undo what I have done. I hope our family will heal and that, over time, I can earn back your trust...
>
> My family bears no responsibility for my choices. I do. Please give them privacy.
>
> ~ Jensen
>
> Source: https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/a-message-to-our-company
// ---
And I just heartfelt sorry for the person to receive so much shame, hatred, mockering, hostility, ridiculing from public... for just his attempts to find love, his peace at heart...
There is no shame in that, I believe, absolutely. This is his business to be not exposed so disgracefully on public.
This is a miracle to proud of, to understand, and respect always.
Sincere heartwarming hug, dear Jensen... I am... sorry... for the people to ridicule on it you nor anyone deserves...
Everyone wants to think they’re morally superior, that they wouldn’t do the same. Newsflash people, having sexual desires is a very natural human thing, it’s wired into us all. You don’t know what his marriage was like. Could’ve been the most draining thing imaginable but maybe he wanted to keep it together for his kids.
He made a very human mistake and now his personal life is on display for the world to read about. I feel sorry for him.
How do you know he did it "for love and peace at heart?"
People coming at this are coming from the opposite assumption: that he's a billionaire and uses that power to fuel an appetite for lust.
I mean, if you look at the evidence, that's what the narrative supports. Both those affairs - one with Alice and one with Kimberley - overlapped in time. It's not that he fell head over heels for someone and pined for them - it's that he didn't resist the temptation to prioritize getting laid over getting love.
Further, matters of the heart are less important than doing the right thing. You don't date a direct report, period. It's unethical for everyone involved, and affects everyone of that woman's coworkers.
I am not saying there's no complexities in matters of the heart. I'm just saying this case is simple, and black and white, and not an excuse for us to turn off our eyes and ears.
I remember Jensen saying he doesn’t have a contract with TSMC. The whole supply is based on a trusted relationship and handshake deals between the two CEOs. I wonder if that relationship is transferable to his successor.
Lot of comments here stating with absolute certainty that China wanted Nvidia chips (they've previously ordered Chinese companies to not buy Nvidia chips https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-09-17/china-age...) and that Alice Huang is a CCP spy (zero public evidence of this).
People who have worked in the national security sector in the US know how China operates. Any Chinese tech personage who is not a CCP spy but who somehow rises to a position of international influence will be recruited to work for the CCP by being made an offer they cannot refuse. In a typical case, there is plenty of evidence but most of it will never be made public for security reasons.
Of course China always denies this, but the evidence for this behavior over thousands of cases is such that the burden of proof is on those who claim such a person was not a spy.
This does not imply that the Chinese people or even its government are "evil" or that we shouldn't do business with them. It's just something that everybody who deals with China needs to be aware of.
I think my pedantic gripe here is that I don't see the people who are made offers they can't refuse by China and are Chinese citizens as "spies" as conventionally defined - they are generally not pretending to be anything other than Chinese business people, and business people passing info along or being asked to do things for/by government don't really make them "spies" IMO - at least not until they've changed citizenship or are working directly in something sensitive. Starting a business in another country to serve the interests of the home country with home country money is more akin to the British East India Company or something like that than being a secret agent as I see it.
The board is considering both internal and external candidates. Who has experience in hardware, has led a trillion-dollar company, has deep connections in Asia, and might be available?
It's possible Tim Cook's phone is ringing right now.
It would be interesting if the story unfolded with Jensen going to TSMC [1] and Tim Cook taking over NVIDIA.
It's hard for me to imagine Cook taking over Nvidia unless it was strictly temporary. I get the impression Cook retired because he wanted to relax and enjoy his golden years. But I agree he'd be a good choice to manage the chaos at Nvidia.
I don’t think Tim Cook would even give the time of the day to the Nvidia board or recruiters. He can bear and hold a grudge for a long time, similar to Steve Jobs. His firing of Scott Forstall and Apple’s dissociation with Nvidia after its GPUs failed in Macs are just two examples.
There’s a rumor that Apple’s Johny Srouji may be tapped to be Nvidia’s CEO. But I’m guessing Apple will do whatever it takes to retain him.
Jensen is basically Nvidia, he has ruled it for over 30 years single handedly, he took the risks and had the vision to take it to where it is today under his leadership. Without him, they are just some chip company, and will be revalued as such. The innovation will stop.
How many of his dozens of direct reports will leave the company as his successor, guided by some management consultancy, convert the company to a more normal hierarchy?
This is insane. This is the best case scenario for China, much better than just getting the chips. They just crippled their biggest competitor. The stock might not crater immediately because of ongoing AI demand, but it will at some point.
Financially, this is probably the best thing that could’ve happened to him…even with the almost assured impending divorce. Wonder if he’s gonna start a new chip company.
He had two back to back scandals that would normally oust any other CEO. Don't fall for the story this is some targeted thing, he screwed up at least twice publicly and they came out very close together ensuring his ouster but both of these individually are likely tenure enders.
I can think of one company that rose from $347 billion to $4.6 trillion market cap after their finance person successfully filled the shoes of an innovator
a CEO doesn't have to be a friend of the consumer- it's not their job. What Jensen made of NVIDIA, now a market leader not just in its original gaming segment, but in compute in general, deserves recognition.
Again, the decision to oust him was correct, but finding someone with a comparable long-term vision and skill is going to be nigh impossible for the company. And sure, bring even more downvotes for that
I don't really care about that. I don't use NVIDIA, I don't own any stock, and there will be other GPU stacks for AI. It's tech industry drama and is kinda trashy and compelling in that respect, but NVIDIA did a lot of nasty things for consumers like me and I have to look elsewhere for the performance I want. The current iteration of NVIDIA being led well is not something I care that much about. If they change their stripes, maybe I'll care more someday.
From Game of Thrones:
- Men without cocks. You wouldn't find me fighting in an army if I had no cock. What's left to fight for?
- Gold?
- I spent my life around soldiers. What do you think they spend that gold on?
- Family.
- Not without a cock, you don't.
- Maybe it really is all cocks in the end.
Elon(and others) got it right by making perfidity a feature of there character right up front by bieng VERY public about whatever they get up to.
Jensen just so happens to be a convienient scapegoat to buy a news cycle away from the very difficult political and economic situation that would otherwise be the lead story, and I bet that having him fold his hand quite so easily is actualy not what they were hoping for, and good on him for doing it.
Apple and Nvidia could hardly be more different here. Apple is a consumer brand, with basically zero presence in data centers. Nvidia is the opposite. They do make GPUs for "consumers" but it's for a small niche of hardcore gamers and basically irrelevant compared to what they make for data centers. An "app store" model would never work there.
Bummer. He stood in the way of regulatory capture and AI monopolists had him removed. I foresee the open model / open weights ecosystem eventually getting locked down, especially the most competitive Chinese models.
It's not about the weights, it's about inference. Banning American inference providers from serving "non-vetted" models would surely bring a lot of customers back to OpenAI and Anthropic. Just when they go public.
Nvidia is not the proximate provider of open weight inference. That’s Nvidia’s customers, cloud compute services like AWS. If there was a move to ban open weights models, I am pretty sure these companies would howl much louder to the government than Nvidia, and they’re arguably more influential as a group.
And specialised providers like Baseten, Fireworks, Together…
If regulation for the sake of safety was to pass, they wouldn’t be able to serve GLM, Kimi, or Deepseek anymore
I wouldn’t underestimate Anthropic’s and OpenAI’s power of nuisance on that regard.
That's not by design though, it's pure happenstance and a lack of competent competitors. Handicapping the entire industry to favor the the manufacturers who chose the wrong R&D path is interfering for no business reason. The only valid reasons are political pressure.
Right. It wasn’t that Jensen had an affair with a foreign spy and that the Nvidia board found damning evidence despite them being very incentivized not to. This is actually the doing of the secret cabal of AI monopolists (all three?). And now because we didn’t look the other way while a CEO was double-timing (talking of course about selling to China while saying he was being faithful to the US) we’re turning the car around and there will be no more open weights for anyone.
It just sucks because Jensen was basically the last big tech CEO that seemed like a human being, and knew what the hell he was talking about. I guess a little too human in the end. But this has pretty much destroyed my last bit of faith in any of them.
Huang has shown catastrophically bad judgement and lied publicly [0]. Many commenters here harbor lots of sympathy for him, I assume out of respect for the technology and company he's built, but that doesn't exonerate him.
He was sleeping with one of his customers—a huge conflict of interest. That alone is good grounds to get a CEO fired, but it only gets worse! Alice Huang, a Chinese national, was previously working for a CCP propaganda channel network with an impeccable acronym: CCTV. Her company was accused publicly and investigated by the government for suspected smuggling of sanctioned NVIDIA hardware into China. Now we learned he also had an affair with one of his direct reports — another diabolical conflict of interest, which alone could be good reason to oust the CEO and possibly the VP as well.
It's yet to be determined whether he disclosed secrets to the Chinese spy, or whether he at least privately admitted to the second affair (if not, that's even worse!)
It's not a single, horrendous mistake anymore but a pattern of disastrously poor judgement. Building an extraordinary company and technology shouldn't mean lack of accountability, and thankfully we found out today that even at the highest level it doesn't.
The apologists in this thread are absolutely shocking. Jensen is a ruthless CEO who clearly lacks moral fiber. Why do we idolize and "feel" for people like this?
I have NVDA stock, I think this is neutral at worst. Obviously bad short term, but the fundamentals are what they are. They are gonna print money for at least the next 5 years no matter what happens.
The reality of the situation is they can be guilty as fuck, but they are so important to the world and us economy, that any sanctions they have will be symbolic. Nobody wants to kill the golden goose, even democrats.
There will be a lot of noise, it will be embarrassing, but I just can't imagine a situation where it significantly impacts their bottom line.
The bear case here is pretty much that you think AI is a bubble anyway, and this just accelerates it.
In order to see this as a bad thing you have to first agree with the export controls. Like Jensen, HN loves chinese models, that's why the outrage does not resonate.
It would be hypocritical to both use DeepSeek and also be outraged at the (alleged) mechanisms through which China acquires GPUs.
I wonder if people haven't seen his interviews or public appearances in the past 1-2 years, especially when anything to do with Trump came up. I don't find CEO interviews particularly interesting to begin with, because they're performing a role and can't give honest answers. Jensen took that dishonesty to a pretty high level.
Ezra Klein interviewed Jensen about 1.5 months ago and I had an off-putting feeling from it, and thought a lot of his answers were laughable. He sounded like he was obviously lying. A few days later, Klein interviewed Bill Gates and sort of anonymously brought up the arguments that Jensen made. You could see a visible disbelief of the arguments in Gates' face and posture, even saying "I almost can't believe you're asking that". (Not that Bill Gates is some paragon, but it wasn't close to a respectful disagreement.)
You could tell Ezra was frustrated in that interview. I thought his first two questions were pushing for a real answer from Jensen and he just sort of let it go because it was clear he wasn't going to get one. The notion that societal shifts were going to be fine and we were just ignoring human ambition, end of answer, was intellectually pretty wild. I also thought the subsequent Bill Gates interview was the perfect follow up.
The most importance sentence from your report is this one from the top of page 6:
> We believe that despite essentially no direct compute sales into China after April 2025, Nvidia continued to service Chinese demand via sales to non-restricted intermediaries and diversion.
That’s not at all breaking export control laws. In fact it is the government’s responsibility to identify these non-restricted intermediaries and make them restricted. The government has done this plenty of times in the past and it should again do so here. It is not a company’s job to infer what the government wants it to do. The difference between selling to China and servicing China-originated demand is huge.
And then in a massive game of telephone many people on this thread actually believes that Nvidia allowed direct sales to China, which is how they conclude Huang is breaking the law.
I did skim all 40 pages. None of the remaining nuance is as important as this sentence in the context of this thread. I made this importance judgement myself. You are of course free to read the whole thing too and point out which other nuances are pertinent to the current discussion.
Whether or not there's proprietary information espionage going on, there are no other explanations on the table for Megaspeed being able to buy billions of dollars of Nvidia chips other than that they are cut out and smuggling channel.
I'm not even that bothered about those chips going to China. But, like a lot of other aspects that leave us wondering how big and how fragile an AI bubble exists, the fact that billions of dollars of Nvidia revenue is from a reportedly priority customer that isn't actually using the chips is the problem.
It's insane. I bet none of the commenters here would spare a thought for a manager at a 7-11 who got fired for having sex with one of his subordinates and ended up on the streets because he couldn't pay his rent.
But one of the wealthiest people on the planet gets fired, suffering zero personal hardship as a result, and everybody's up in arms. How could you do this! They all do this, how dare you single him out!
I think that there's a pervasive idea, especially in the tech/startup space, that making money is a moral good. Not merely that making money is compatible with being a good person, but that it makes you a good person, and the more you make the more good you are. Firing an ultra-rich person is therefore basically an affront to a saint. Never mind that it doesn't put them under any hardship, that they and their heirs will still be wealthier than any of us can even conceive of. It's morally wrong to do anything bad to such a good person.
In other contexts we expect some transparency if you have a stake in what is happening. This thread is full of tech workers, and would look very different if each comment was prefaced with some sort of 'Hello, I am John Doe. Nvidia represents 35% of my retirement portfolio, and the semiconductor industry overall represents over 70%. This is why I do not care to rock the boat, and think he did nothing wrong...'
You're asking why posters in a VC forum, in an industry that is despised by the public for its wanton greed, societal destruction, and complete disdain towards humanity would want to protect one of their own?
Bro, this is what the tech industry is all about: fucking over society to make a dollar.
He sucks but even if I take the worst interpretation of what it looks like this guy did and assume there's a bunch of other affairs I just don't have enough energy to get worked up about something so comparatively small potatoes. I don't idolize or feel sorry for him, but he was a competent leader of his company. Nvidia will be a weaker company without him and I think the fears of an inference lock on GPUs to prop up slime ball American AI companies is more likely to come true with him gone. The next CEO is more likely to accept a bride to make it happen.
So you think quid pro quo sexual harassment in the workplace is no big deal? People should be able to fuck their way to the top, and bosses should be able to demand sex from you to keep your job?
The reason this is all going so quickly now is because they realised how deep the shit is Jensen put the company in.
There will be an endless walk of shame for Jensen that would constantly drag the price of the company down, because this is the perfect opportunity for the Democrats to fly out of the gate in January and put the fear of god into the other billionaire oligarchs again. Punish one with extreme measures the others will fall in line, because at the end of the day they are all pussys.
Remember Elon wanted to do cagefighting with Zuckerberg. Those two losers had every excuse ready not to fight in the end. They didn’t even touch gloves for a single sparring. Manly men. All they can do is tough talk.
Plus the voters will see at least one party is doing something against blatant billionaire corruption, with corruption being the third most important topic in the elections.
There needs to be made an example of what happens to you if you start selling weapons-grade technology to the enemies of the United States for personal profit, and then think you are above the law.
This is not over for Jensen. And also not over for Nvidia, so the only sane thing to do is get as much distance between the "rogue" CEO and the company. Same for the White House, let’s see how often we see Jensen and Trump still together.
They are going to throw him under the bus and say he had the opportunity and the access and the power to do this without anyone else noticing, especially as he was sexually manipulating managers that directly report to him on important corporate issues.
They will make it look as though it’s all Jensen’s fault because otherwise they stop being a trillion-dollar company.
It’s a fitting end for Jensen Huang.
He gets taken down by the holy trifecta of power, money and politics he valued above his own marriage or what this whole mess would do to his kids.
He even lied in his public apology because he still was confident the other affair with his married manager would never surface because he truly believes he is smarter than anyone else.
What a loser. 140B deep pockets and still a loser.
Money is only paper. All that counts is family.
Threw away his life’s work, his marriage and every last drop of respect for him as a man, father and husband his kids could ever have for pocket change and some ass.
I'm actually surprised at this. I figured everyone would justify keeping him because he made Nvidia (and investors) so much money. Money > anything else
Plus Jensen Huang is an immigrant from Taiwan. And this administration does not like people who haven't been born on this geographical soil (being not born on US soil, I am obviously not against it, just pointing out obvious animosity of current US administration towards immigrants in general)
you mean financially successful right? Otherwise both are terrible parasites and recently we just seeing tip of an iceberg when it comes to Vivek (I know 2 people that worked for him, but I will leave it at that).
I don't know why you're getting downvotes. The parent comment, "Most likely the internal findings from the investigation point to something more troubling/illegal", is comical. The information on the public record already points to something troubling/illegal, as you just pointed out!
A CEO admitting to an affair with a customer after previously denying it, seems like a sufficient reason for removal, even before you add the geopolitical intrigue.
Because the customer in question raises questions of the CEO's judgement, plus the possibility of knowledge that the target was violating sanctions. We don't know. That's why it's a bad situation for the stock.
The stock seems to be responding more heavily to the potential loss of Jensen than it does to the potential continuation of Jensen given new knowledge.
It also seems like there’s a high potential for half of Jensen’s position to be granted in a subsequent divorce decree, meaning there could be enormous selling pressure in the next several years.
I don’t think she’s likely to sell it right away, but I do think she’s a lot more likely to sell it sooner than they would have together as of last week.
That change is still material to the future outlook as the price is the intersection of supply and demand and the predicted supply of $NVDA shares for sale just increased by scores of billions of dollars worth.
Morality is not a straight line, once someone has cheated they sort of accepted it for themselves after feeling guilty but that doesn't transfer to other places where someones morals are challenged.
Relationships and stock price are built on trust. An affair, a relationship with a customer/subordinate, and an attempted cover-up are all breaches of that trust.
> Why is an affair with a customer grounds for announcing a resignation that caused an instant 10% stock price drop?
OP said
>A CEO admitting to an affair with a customer *after previously denying it*, seems like a sufficient reason for removal
It's not the crime. It's the cover up.
In this case Jensen either 1) lied to the board about the affair, 2) directed the Nvidia PR to publish a materially false statement about it, or 3) both.
From a company governance standpoint it's incredibly hard to trust Jensen when he's either lying to you, using the company to protect his personal life, or (again) both.
Admitting to the affair with a customer is a nothingburger. Directing the company to release a false statement about it, and that customer turns out to be a Chinese asset if a BIG fucking deal.
Lying about it served no one's interest but Jensen's, and ended up hurting the company significantly.
I'd go as far as to say the second leak helps him a bit, by reframing this as a cheating scandal rather than it being more about him knowingly evading an embargo.
Having an affair with your direct report also wildly increases the risk that Nvidia would be embroiled in high-profile lawsuits, either for sexual harassment or favoritism
Two back to back including one with a subordinate and one involving a person violating export controls though are pretty tough to weather. And I doubt that's the end of the affairs too, I'm not a Huang is months away from having dated every woman on earth extrapolationist but I also doubt he's only had (or has) 2.
Nvidia's previous denials are a significant issue from a board of directors position. He either lied to the board about it, directed the company's PR people to make a false statement about it, or both. And that lie turned out to be material (in a SEC sense of the word material).
It would be very difficult for the board to regain trust in his ability to make choices that are correct for Nvidia, rather than himself.
That certainly won't be the conclusion of the board as less surprising firing Jensen - stock-wise the best-performing CEO of this decade so far - affects the stock way more negatively than sex affairs with spies and employees made public because shareholders don't care about your sexual moral or code of conducts for regular employees (of which neither Jensen nor Kimberly were). So there is more to it than the public will be let known.
Wouldn't this open him up to blackmail and espionage? The people he cheated with whether they exploited it or not had kompromat on him. Not only that but the new allegations show he has a pattern of acting a way that would let people get kompromat on him, and investors were probably not previously pricing in that the CEO himself was a huge insider risk, and now that the cat's out of the bag, they are. Even if he leaves now that wouldn't undo one of his affair partners stealing proprietary info.
If the Huang has a secret relationship with a report then he's in a lot of trouble and the company is in some trouble. If the companies response to that relationship is to do nothing - now the company and Huang are both in a lot of trouble. Heck the problem with the first affair isn't the is she or is she not a spy - if Huang could convincingly argue that he didn't know then he's a victim - the problem is having a relationship with a customer, that's actually not much better then with a report.
After the news about a potential foreign compromise, disclosure of an affair with a subordinate is pretty damning. One can be discounted as poor judgement. Two is a pattern that's hard to dismiss. I wonder if we'll learn of other shenanigans or whether kicking him out stops future (possible) disclosures.
Poor judgment? He was larger than life persona, many times compared to Musk (minus huge Twitter follower) who is also very well known for his extramarital affairs.
Its like saying: I mean, molesting children is not nice and not morally great, but who cares for a priest? He isn't hired for being a good person, he is hired to conduct worship services during Sunday mass.
An adult woman being wronged by infidelity is not remotely like a child being molested. Wth is wrong with you?
No one cares about the sex life of a ceo of a company that big except their own direct family. Investors don't care, customers don't care, vendors don't care, the government doesn't care, and that's the entire list of people that matter. His wife and other immediate family care and that's it.
The only reason anyone (of any relevance or significance) cares in this case is becsuse of the embargo & national security angle.
I think they go spooked because he's been a proponent of relaxing export controls to China and it turns out it's because his mistress/gf is a chinese spy who is influencing him. And NVIDIA is making what currently is probably a product of national security importance.
If I was them, I'd be worried that the government invoke the Defense Production Act (DPA) or impose National Security Agreements and Clearances which would require NVIDIA to isolate sensitive R/D, restrict foreign nationals from accessing specific chip designs, and place government-vetted compliance monitors on its board or security teams. ALSO there definately will be subpeonos and probes and those are never fun.
Easier to say we cut out the guy responsible and hopefully that lessons the troubles
This is what I keep coming back to. The board is not some random board. They know Jensen is their golden goose, there is no NVIDIA without Jensen. What they saw must have been company-existentially-illegal for them to throw their golden goose under the bus as a survival tactic.
edit: btw the board has a director that’s ex-Cooley, no greenhorn I imagine to congressional investigational scrutiny. It had to be something that made them realize cutting ties with Jensen immediately was the only way to survive.
Jack Clark Co-founder and head of policy at Anthropic / head of the Anthropic Institute is the nyt and @AnaSwanson "source" he is the one coordinating a coup against Jensen.
But they are going to be hit by this as well - this is a strike against the whole AI ecosystem and honestly, the US economy as a whole considering how propped up it is by the hype.
interesting. the timing would favor their IPO in terms of flexing their ability to move policy through extra-judicial means. but it would also benefit them to coattail the narrative even if they weren't players so I wouldn't assume it without evidence.
There are lots of reasons to do this. Many of the work in the favor of the the person ratting. There are strong whistleblower protections for some of the reasons that work against that person.
For intents and purposes, consider NVIDIA compromised for some foreseeable future. For operations and future purchases/CAPEX, more than a passing due dilligence is warranted if considering NVIDIA.
What are the implications if up to 15% of revenue was "fake"? The investors have been pricing Nvidia based on demand and revenue from (most places except for China). Since it turns out that it was actually (most places including China), doesn't that imply the market is actually smaller than they thought? Can buyers sue because they paid increased prices for their products due to sanction breaking by Nvidia?
"The state of the world economy and the future of open models would be in turmoil due to the affairs of a person who's not even a politician" was not on my 2026 bingo card.
It's not a personal romantic relationship if the other side is either a direct subordinate or the head of a chip smuggling operation in violation of federal export control laws
- Relationships with subordinates is a violation of policy, demonstrating a lack of judgement and a willingness to break the rules
- Relationships with subordinates create legal liability for the company by enabling claims of sexual harassment, hostile workplace, coercion/abuse of authority
If people want a system where individuals are not going to break the rules it should ensure:
- every trivial action, or lack of it, is not garanteed to break some of the mountains of existing including set of rules one is supposed to obey when it's physically impossible to even assimilate them all
- people that do respect the rules can have decent level of certitude they will have a fine life without major troubles that could be avoided by breaking some rules
- the culture promote to respect rules as a viable flexible path, as opposed to actively promote one that states "it's easier to get pardon than to be granted authorization".
Everyone is welcome to assess their own society from what they experienced in life.
Sure, the comment here was more general than specific to the topic, however once you favor some behavior in society, one should not be surprised to which extend it will flourish.
Your comment focuses solely on company profits. I don’t care about company profits. I do care about HR or company policy policing things they should not be allowed to police.
It's not about sex, it's about integrity and decision making, which directly impacts NVIDIA and through them, US national security. His board asked him questions and he lied to them, and they found out in the press.
A bunch of you on here think this is about sex, it's not, it's about signals that point to extremely poor leadership decisions and threats to the US economy and national security.
A corporate conflict of interest occurs when an individual's or entity's personal, financial, or outside relationships interfere or appear to interfere with their ability to act in the best interests of the company or its stakeholders
I would agree for a "regular" employee - as the CEO you are literally the face of the company, so you are held to a higher standard. When you look bad publicly, the company looks bad - that's the job you agree to when you become CEO.
He's the hero we needed but didn't deserve. If this thing didn't happen my guess is open models wouldn't exist and we would be deeper and darker into the whole AI boom
How illegal is it for a CEO to sell goods (potentially a core component used in military weapons) to a foreign government after your government said not to?
- we can't allow China access to buy or lease any GPUs
and
- turns out China is half the customer base, so cutting them off will crash the market, and the Chinese will just build their own anyways
Considering Trump & Jensen traveled to China just to sell more GPUs and despite that the CCP banned Chinese companies from importing Western Hardware in favor of domestic alternatives, I have my doubts this story makes sense
Interesting! If they have this, why are the Chinese labs still so compute-limited (hence relying on distillation instead of training from scratch), and why do they seem to want Nvidia chips so badly?
Everyone, including the Chinese labs, seem to understand that Huawei's chips are not as capable as their press releases make them out to be.
Also, for what it's worth, tech-insider.org is an embarrassingly lazy AI-generated content farm: https://tech-insider.org/about/
I would hazard a guess that Huawei is paying to get positive stories about their chips on the English-language internet, because they certainly aren't getting any organically!
They are not as capable certainly but considering they didn't have anything like 3-4 years ago, I'd say the potential to catch up is there.
Also like OpenAI's Jalapeno, with LLMs it might be feasible to deploy relatively simpler silicon that's hard to program for, and farm out implementation to AI so the CUDA moat might be shallower than before.
>I would hazard a guess that Huawei is paying to get positive stories about their chips on the English-language internet, because they certainly aren't getting any organically
Jensen has said that 7nm Huawei chips are comparable to A100-level chips, and even fairly recent models as of 1>year ago were trained on those and process improvements are not what they used to be
Don't think people realize that whichever politician executes a tech CEO will likely become President for life. The public absolutely hate these people and blood is in the water. Democratic politicians know this, republican politicians know this.
we'll see whether it was about the affairs if Nvidia keeps promoting open weight models or just becomes a supplier for openai and anthropic's closed ecosystems for 'national security' reasons.
I am in shock, Jensen is one of the pioneers in our industry and we will always remember his accomplishments. But I do fear Nvidia will now only make safe bets and not be able to innovate in an ongoing industrial revolution because they lack their biggest, boldest visionary to set the direction. This man has created an insane wealth for over 50% of his employees. An extraordinary leader, engineer, salesman and team builder. I still believe in the excellent talent at Nvidia, but I do not believe in a board that fires their best person and we have seen several examples of a board/leadership ruining a company because they lack the founders vision, fighting spirit and ownership. Jensen deserved another punishment, not getting fired.
> Jensen deserved another punishment, not getting fired.
If he knowingly sent GPUs to Megaspeed knowing they would get in Chinese hands, he is guilty of Conspiracy, Espionage, SEC violations, and Export Control violations.
Just the Espionage charge alone is 20yr to life, with the possibility of execution/death penalty.
I actually think this may be worse for the gaming industry, which more lay people will care about. Jensen was a gamer and clearly excited about pushing innovation there.
I hear they're (temporarily) replacing him with a non-engineer finance suit.
It would be shocking, but with gaming making up just 1/20 of their revenue, maybe someone who doesn't actually care just says "we're pulling back from the consumer market to focus on our real business."
I mean practically speaking if he gets hauled in front of congress we don’t know that money would keep flowing. Investor lawsuits, etc, like - it could have become financially unteneble as well.
I cant help but see a difference in the moral standard to which Jensen is being held compared to the moral standard that someone like Elon is being held. Why can one get away with shocking moral behaviour, but the other has to step down for a mild affair. If Jensen didnt have the affair, or it never came to light, would all of this still have taken place?
When Cambridge Analytica happened, no one kicked Mark out of Facebook/Meta.
Not making excuses for Jensen, at his status and power level, this stuff goes with the territory. But I cant help but see a double standard here.
This isn’t a case of being punished for doing the right thing. The right thing is retaining control of your own company and doing so is not “authoritarian”.
To be honest, I don't know how to succinctly tell you that this is a bad take. For starters, that company has hoovered enough tax money that we should all be on the board. Secondly, encouraging family feudalism is crazy if you even claim to be a supporter of capitalism and the free market. Thirdly, you're not a tech baron and never will be, especially if you can't trust that your investments are concerned with your interests and goals due to CEO exceptionalism. Just saying. If he was a judge, he would be disbarred. This company wants to be a stupid percentage of our GDP, so they're gonna have to suck it up and hold themselves to the standards of a public office.
I think you’re confused on the essence of what he was trying to say.
The comparison was drawn because when you are such a position of power, your actions have such a monumental sway. Thousands, millions of people’s of lives are impacted, for better or for worse. In Jensen’s case, that’s up to the court of public opinion.
However the thinking is that when you are in that position, a just and fair society would probably want to keep just and fair and morally tact people in those positions.
IMHO I don’t care what way you want to spin it, when you have that level of influence over one of the major drivers of the AI boom, you have INCREDIBLE power compared to what most people think of when you say “private citizen”.
Agreed. The fact that he gets this perception while Musk has repeatedly betrayed the US's best interests shows that things like rationality and merit have gone out the window. However, don't mistake this for me excusing either of their behavior. Neither are not suited for that level of responsibility.
I don’t entirely follow this comparison. Maybe we spend time in different circles, but Musk in the current day is nearly universally s*t on by everybody I know. Even the people I know that still praise his work remain with a bad taste in their mouth.
My buddies and I were just talking about how Jensen is probably one of the MOST liked amongst all the leading big tech CEO/Owners. I feel like the amount of grace this thread is giving him is proof of that.
I don’t understand how that’s comparable to the perception of Musk.
Having a libido is fairly normal for most non-castrated men, at least historically speaking. In modern times, men are in seemingly depressed and in general need of various pills to help with erectile dysfunction, which perhaps in part explains the low birth rates.
What did he do that was “playing with fire” specifically? Having long term sexual relationships with women?
The thing he did that was actually wrong was that the NVIDIA executive he was in a sexual relationship with was herself married. That is actually wrong, that’s not “playing with fire”, that’s simply wrong.
Sorry but IMO this sort of company structure should not be allowed. Private companies should not be able to issue stocks the way Zuck & Elon have. Pull Meta’s charter and redistribute their assets. Let that serve as a notice to Elon that he’s next.
The argument is that the shareholders who own the majority of a company's stock (by value, not voting rights) should be able to control the company, not a minority owner. It is the corporate structure that allows guaranteed minority control (e.g. Zuckerberg owns something like 13% of Meta, but controls 60% of the voting power). In a free market, why should publicly traded companies be allowed to sell "shares" that are not ownership in the traditional sense?
In an actual free market the distinction between “public” and “private” company would be really just some transparency/accounting standard or set of standards set by the particular exchange(s) that the shares were traded on.
And just to be clear in practice, stocks are not priced based on their voting rights but rather expectations of their future cash flows (dividends) or simply how much the stock is expected to go up or down by. A lot of modern financial activity is nonsense.
If you really want to actually understand what a company is you should go look up when corporations became a thing and why. It had to do with various legal protections to stimulate economic activity and tax revenues.
All of these modern notions and principles that you’re invoking or basing your arguments on about ownership are most likely just contrived nonsense. These aren’t necessarily eternal principles of anything.
Ask almost anyone here and they'll tell you that the C-suite are mostly a bunch of morons who don't know anything about technology, and now you want to ensure that businesses can only ever be run by such technologically illiterate morons, not founders? Insanity!
It's entirely fair to think that, given what I said, that I would mean to do this without some form of legal basis. Not so!
Is it my view that Meta has engaged in a sustained course of unlawful conduct that persists despite the judgements the law has already applied, and will persist into the future. As a corporation who is consistently in court, and based in Delaware, it surely seems to me the bar has been passed -- the AG of the state would be well within their rights to revoke their charter. Meta's entire basis of being at this point is to control public discourse. That's direct harm to the state and the public at large.
What happens to their assets afterwards is a job for the courts. Applying existing law is "retroactive authoritarian". Pfft, please. Ignorance of the law is not a defense against it.
The idea of a board of directors is one that actually has to be defended on first principles.
What is the actual value add of a “board of directors” except to basically be weak willed PMC/non founder-type people with a lot to lose reputationally and financially who can be cowed and/or blackmailed very easily.
The typical person on the board of a public company would fold to pressure as soon as they saw a NY Times reporter called their phone.
I'm not sure if you're being facetious. The board of directors role is to look after the shareholders' interests. A good board is exactly that - the representatives of the shareholders.
And in this case they fired a CEO who created more shareholder value than almost any person in human history and they didn’t fire him for declining performance.
> The lesson is that if you do the right, non-authoritarian thing, you get punished
Cheating on your wife and betraying your country is the right, non authoritarian thing? We arent having this discussion for any other reason than those two events happening. Its an insane lens of entitlement to view the situation as if he should indefinitely retain ownership due to ... what? Existing? But never have any of his actions have consequences. That's the promise you make by positioning the board shares in that manner: you promise to have accountability. Finding it a weakness to answer to others for your actions is definitely a popular style of thinking amongst the current group of wanna-be authoritarians in the presidential cabinet, "strange" how your first two examples of CEOs unwaveringly align with that political faction huh?
In neoliberalism, there is no such thing as society (Thatcher). When there is no society, you can't be held accountable for previously non-acceptable moral transgressions.
If you are competing in a neoliberal environment where other companies play by these rules, you are at a disadvantage if you are following some superset of them.
I am not saying that he has done 100% right things, I am just saying that if he set himself up in the same way as his competitors, he would have been fine. Maybe he would have to pay some fine/bribe, similar to what the prior 2 have done for their infractions against the people.
History has actually tested this question quite extensively, and the overwhelming result is that, on aggregate, an entity where power is distributed is more successful than an entity where power is concentrated. Setting up Nvidia like Meta or Tesla might have been the best thing for Jensen, but clearly wouldn’t have been the best thing for Nvidia. And, quite frankly, over the past few years those other two are pretty good examples of why.
You're missing the point of the commenter which is that neoliberal social order confounds the empirical evidence. The framing of "x approach is better for a company's success" is a non-question, it is beside the point. Distribution of power "under neoliberalism" is a self contradictory model.
You don't have to agree with leftists but ignoring the premise just lets you talk past the point.
> if he set himself up in the same way as his competitors, he would have been fine.
Jensen chose to set up his company in such a way that he had to follow a superset of the rules that his competitors did. My point is that was a competitive advantage; even though it unmade him, that superset was a necessary tradeoff to be the head of a $4T company. We can see this because those other companies have started to be held financially accountable; the same lack of accountability that lets those leaders get away with affairs also lets them “get away with” withholding evidence (and the resulting $243M punitive damages). Unaccountable power (which is what parent is arguing for) is brittle and fragile.
The lesson is that if you allow yourself to be held accountable by other for poor decision making then they might do that. Huang created a corporate structure that could hold him accountable for bad behavior and it did just that when he behaved badly. He did the "right" thing in setting up his company and it acted as designed.
No one really cares, in the grand scheme, that he had affairs. He's being ousted because he potentially compromised national objectives. The NVDA board knows that senate hearings are coming, and want to make sure they have distanced the company from him before that happens (and all the text messages, emails, and details come to light).
The biggest questions are:
1. Did Jensen knowingly compromise national security (criminal implications)
2. What is the fallout / impact in the AI arms race
I think the main issue is Jensen crossed the bright red line of national security. Whatever Zuck or Elon did they were nowhere near as political damaging.
Jensen isn't stepping down for the affair. He's stepping down because the affair was with a Chinese spy, and his words and actions appear to have facilitated circumvention of exports bans to China, and he concealed it.
Shareholders don't care that he's having sex outside his marriage.
Elon Musk has no accountability. He has effective control over the boards of his companies. Shareholders know that the value of their shares is predicated largely on this one man, so removing him would destroy their value.
Government could hold him accountable, and some of those gears have been turning over the last decade. In response he has spent a lot of money trying to steer elections and gain the influence of the ones in power to try to avoid accountability from that direction as well.
The double standard is that if you play capitalism well enough you are shielded from the consequences that others would face.
shocking moral behavior? a lot of things comes to mind. Asking Epstein for the wildest night in the island is among them.
shocking illegal behavior? Buying votes in an election with his 1 million per day republican votes lottery.
The list is large and clearly Elon has been much more damaging to the public than Jensen but he has spent much more to be close to politicians so no consequences for him.
bwoah i don't know...DOGE, """roman salute""" on stage, supporting the AfD and other far-right parties, pushing far-right propaganda and conspiracy theories on X, throttling Starlink in Ukraine, misleading investors, empty promises, possible Epstein connections, breeding a dozen of kids and not caring about them, supporting and donating to DJT as you've said, i could go on but it seems futile.
Why do you think Elon has involved himself so directly and closely in politics? He spent almost half a billion to ingratiate himself with Trump and co.
I mean the guy tried to break a national security law.
Yes Elon and Zuck are abhorrent, but when they have tried to break the law, they have been held accountable in some sense. Not to the extent that they deserve it, but still.
If they become as big a libility to their businesses, even their controling shares won't save them
Musk and Zuckerberg are simply more politically shrewd.
There’s no actual evidence that Huang broke a national security law. Even if there is, we need the federal prosecutors to say so rather than random commentators on the internet. Even when prosecutors say so in this country we presume people to be innocent until proven by court to be guilty. I have personally looked into the rumors and I don’t believe Huang broke any law.
First, I think it’s important we all remember that NVIDIA issued this resignation. NVIDIA’s board != Meta’s or any other company’s board. So there is no double standard because it’s not the same people.
Second, there is no proof that any moral standard is being applied at all. This could (and in my opinion likely) have nothing to do with a moral standard and more to do with extenuating information uncovered in the investigation or a strategic shift to protect against the current admin. There is likely so much happening behind the scenes and so many people have so much money to lose, I think it’s prudent for us to first exhaust all non-moral possibilities (unfortunately).
Elon made Tesla using Chinese automation, and China was its second biggest market (and largest for some models). Even though there are the same export controls for Chinese EVs, Elon managed to get around it politically. And lastly, Detroit isn't as shameless and ruthless as Ant/OpenAI are.
This is wrong and made up. Tesla was made in America, if anything they acquired a german automation company. No export controls existed to be subverted.
What kind of a shill are you exactly? U post a lot about China
I do think a lot of people are projecting their societal and marriage expectations onto Jensen. They're expecting that he should follow the same set of standards they follow with their partner. Yes, monogamy is the societal norm - but it is not a requirement of a relationship. And, it is certainly not a requirement of a relationship that you're not a participant in.
In my eyes, this all comes down to the perception that someone is able to be compromised by non-monogamy. Jensen came out, apologized to his wife, and (at least publicly) communicated that he broke the expectations and boundaries of their relationship. This clearly communicated that a secret relationship compromises his position. And, should there be more secret relationships they'd continue to be used as leverage.
Musk isn't subject to this leverage because it's pretty clear that his relationships are not built on traditional definitions. Non-monogamy is either a clearly defined boundary in his relationship or simply not something that concerns him as leverage.
this isn't about a moral standard; no one cares about the affairs
the board must know that the risk of Jensen staying on (likely due to whatever hasn't yet been brought to light) is greater than the risk of instability by firing him; whatever is unknown to us must be pretty serious (again, not in terms of more affairs, but other stuff, like selling chips to China or whatever)
Meta's board probably would have fired Zuck over the CA scandal but they were unable to because of the company structure
That's not certain. I tend to agree with you, but it is possible that the concern is for the effect on the employees. Especially the 2nd known affair is a violation of HR rules that are supposed to apply to everyone, and it's hard to argue that when you don't apply them to your CEO. By itself, I'm highly doubtful it would be enough (you can slap him on the wrist or something), but the effect on morale and company culture is a much larger concern. If people lose confidence in the company, they're more likely to jump ship, so you pay them more. And if investors lose confidence over any of this, then that's a much bigger and more expensive problem. There's a moral standard behind these types of things, even if it doesn't directly matter.
What we don't know and what really happened at the emergency board meeting are probably the key here. I'm sure there's plenty more going on that we can't see. More affairs are obviously possible, which is kind of meh until you find out who they were with and what deals they were part of.
It's even possible that Huang made the call -- it's not like he's going to escape public shaming at this point, and depending on his calculations of the repercussions, he could easily have tens of billions of dollars riding on this. He is clearly good at taking actions that maximize the market value of his company -- might this be another such action? Our armchairs aren't the best perspective from which to evaluate that.
> the moral standard that someone like Elon is being held
Elon’s comparable fuck-up was betraying Ukraine with his Starlink intervention. It’s a huge deal. Unlike Nvidia, he has no Board to hold him accountable, it will have to be done by the Congress and states. (Europe will be useless as usual.)
As a result, that hammer will fall much more directly on his companies. It will just take more time to do so.
Zuckerberg, to my knowledge, hasn’t compromised American security in a comparable way to these two.
> if they do see it they don't care. This bubble is convinced they are untouchable
If this were just the elites being out of touch, that would be one thing. It's more. There are rafts of folks–you can see them on here–who are convinced the only reason Jensen could be facing any wrath right now is because of a hare-brained conspiracy. This is honestly-felt fandom bordering on zeal.
> Musk gave Ukraine Starlink with the condition it not be used for warfare
You're saying Musk didn't know Ukraine was using these terminals for war, including air defenses, for the last few years? Despite constantly tweeting about it? And doesn't know that's what they're being used for now? What?
The best evidence for this being more ketamine nonsense is that Musk initially lied about the cut-off having been Trump's decision. Unfortunately, this time his actions may have crossed into treason–when he did this, he gave aid and comfort to an ally of a country America was at war with (Iran).
I don't. Musk himself conceded and gave the B.S. about ToS violations.
In any case, sure, he can say it actually wasn't him under oath. Burn that pardon.
> considering Trump is aiding Putin who aids Iran
Trump is the President. Musk is a private citizen.
> don’t think Elon will face any consequences regardless of the truth
I had this exact conversation with a Silicon Valley executive about Jensen Huang on Monday. There is a blind spot in Silicon Valley about the fury aimed at tech executives from across the political spectrum.
The fact that a bunch of people are publicly tweeting that this was a mistake shows just how clueless our cadre of SV elites are.
> You don't think impregnating an employee is an issue?
Never said anything close to that.
I think it's horrible. And it's an issue that's gotten multiple Fortune 100 CEOs fired [1]. It's categorically distinct from corruption and compromise of national-security laws.
I guess you’re unfamiliar then with the ways in which Facebook failed to prevent (and therefore enabled) Russian interference in US elections over the past decade?
Certainly feels to me like compromising American security
Let's put aside that American "free market" scam for now.
Actually, problems where the ownership structure causes CEOs to be removed have been happening over the past 10 years or so.
For example: OpenAI's Altman, Musk, and so on.
Therefore, the ownership structure of Musk's new company SpaceX, which allows him to keep the company firmly under his control, is a very smart approach.
I think a large portion of new companies in the future will become like this.
Having an affair with a Chinese Spy and potentially skirting an export ban to sell chips to China AND having an affair with your direct report are not remotely morally or legally comparable to anything Elon or Mark have done. Shocking you would even consider that.
I didn't care who he's tupping, yes he's a piece of shit and his wife should take him to the cleaners. What we should all be looking at is how far the company was prepared to go in pursuit of greater profits and start evaluating the circular financing of the AI industry with that in mind.
I don't care who he's tupping, yes he's a piece of shit and his wife should take him to the cleaners. What we should all be looking at is how far the company was prepared to go in pursuit of greater profits and start evaluating the circular financing of the AI industry with that in mind.
He didn't build it from scratch un-nurtured. He built it with help from people smarter than him, and with external capital that has severely diluted his stake in the org.
He's a <3.5% shareholder.
He then carried out actions which put the jobs of people smarter than him at risk, and also put the capital that gave him a platform at risk.
What is, however had, more interesting is that many of
his statements did not age well. Now, mind you - I still
think it is his private life at the end of the day; one
can reason about foreign spies, but then the same question
can be asked about Trump and his strange addiction to
Putin. As well as how Jen-Hsun was so obedient to a
mainland-China female, when the other Taiwanese are
scared of being possibly invaded and subsequently killed
by dictator Xi, just as dictator Putin commits to his
own personal genocide against Ukrainians right now.
But, with regards to statements, I distinctly remember
Jen-Hsun berating the british as incompetent economists.
I watched that on a shorts on youtube; can not find it
right now (google search AND youtube search sucks to
no ends now). Well - he may be right that the UK suffers
huge economic problems, but boy, this has not aged well.
People will poke fun at his love of women potentially
being spies while berating the british as being too
incompetent in economics. Perhaps he was too incompetent
in his own love life?
This is the reason no other ceo projects an image of being good guy. One affair and everything you build just collapses. And on the other side rich people can be doing anything and nothing moves markets for their deeds lol
i hate this moral outrage. what's wrong if he was sleeping around? let him just print gpu. his ability to print gpus has nothing to do what he does in his bedroom. i can sympathaize with the wife and infidelity is a sin. but he was supplying everybody with gpu. so that makes him a great guy too.
Because there is potentially more to the story that would impact the actual business than just affairs. The board is to protect the business and if they make a move like this, they do so in the best interest of shareholders. We will see if anything comes out but I suspect it’s not just sleeping around.
There is also fears of a federal investigation and the ability to scapegoat Jensen may be the best move, business wise
If he had affairs with normal staffers and NOT involved with a chinese spy, he'd probably would have survived. The fact that he's out means he definitely supplied the chinese with chips.
I don’t approve of his actions, but the man was in charge of the whole AI revolution… like Wall Street hotshots a small scandal is navigable but this? THIS? They had no choice.
To my knowledge, Sergey Brin remained on as president (although he was not CEO) after admitting to an affair with a Google employee, and every other publicly-confirmed affair with a subordinate led to the CEO stepping down. Boards HAVE been known to put in a lot of effort to keep affairs from being publicly confirmed, though.
Lots of HNers chiming in that consent is all that matters, so the affair with a subordinate is totally fine.
Perhaps this may help explain why it's unethical to date a direct report to those HNers:
- It's unfair to the coworkers of the subordinate, because the affair can give the impression of influencing promotion, personnel and monetary decisions you make in favour of the subordinate.
- It places your direct report in a compromising position. Such a relationship is potentially coercive, because the direct report may fear reprisal, rendering any consent invalid. Many have commented that imputing coercion to any power imbalance leads to the absurd conclusion a rich person shouldn't date at all - however, this use of "slippery slope" doesn't offset your ethical duty as a leader. As the boss, you have to protect your employees, and placing them in this situation in the first place violates that commitment.
tl;dr you violate your duty of care, plain and simple, to everyone underneath you by doing this.
A pragmatic, ethical workplace policy is to instead date people not in your reporting chain. If that means you shouldn't date your employees as CEO, then that's responsible behaviour, not a chafing limitation.
---
Others have commented that Jensen's affair is plausibly fine because "we don't know his private affairs". Jensen has made an unambiguous statement about hurting his wife and family - if they were non-monogamous, Jensen has had the opportunity to disclose it. Absent that, you have to assume this was an illicit affair. Moreover, none of this changes the fact that having an affair with a direct report was entirely unethical.
Still others have attempted a whataboutism by asking why "other CEOs" haven't had this level of blowback for having an affair with a subordinate. Unfortunately, not every tragedy gets the same level of public reaction, for no other reason than timing, luck, or lack if engagement. We should be equally upset about all the other cases as a general rule, rather than relying on normalized apathy to lull us into complacence.
This seems like a wild over reaction to the stock. Does anyone actually think Jensen being CEO of Nvidia is with $1 trillion in market cap?! The reason Nvidia is dominant is because of their ecosystem and them having the best chips, not because of some guy that leads the company.
Any guesses if that correlates with earnings? Are they bad, so they can they, look we already have new CEO, now everything is going to be better. Or are they that good, that they can say, look we will manage without Jensen.
And now nothing is stopping him from defecting over to China and Deepseek. Lost his family, lost his job, and China has plenty of money mountains and a very dedicated workforce. The idea must have crossed his mind.
This is going to be very unpopular here, but this domino triggered by the China hawks in the current admin (and the handful of dem lobbyists in the pocket of openai/ant) is going to go down in history as a massive geopolitical and technological blunder.
Huawei just announced a fully domestic computer, Deepseek is rumored to be training v5 right now on entirely domestic Ascend chips.
I know eventually there will come out all the justifications for how this was to protect AGI, etc. But this move has also now tipped the scale beyond just the hardware bifurcation, but also the open vs. closed and commons vs. sovereign models. This isn't just chopping off your nose, this is America purposely gouging out it's eyes and removing it's ability to see down the road. Jensen Huang was the world's best shot and trying to keep a global AI world together, but one side has made their voice on that extremely loud and clear.
I wish there was more commentary on your point of view. HN has really disappointed me today. I come here for the deeper insight and instead I got Reddit lite. I read the NVIDIA way when it came out and was gobsmacked that all these years the company was operating the way that it did. It really made me admire the perseverance the employees went through and made me realize Jensen was a hidden gem. Seeing China announce their own GPUs made me think NVIDIA was in for some sweat but now? Its as if they are torpedoing NVIDIA for a short term gain only to not realize they have just tossed the long term win to China. The conspiracy theorist in me think they are hoping to pin the blame on the left or they think they can remain in the shadows and break companies that dont play ball no matter how important they are and walk away unscathed. This is a serious fundamental problem in modern American governance that might scare talented people away from the country.
Astroturfed talking points is prevalent since like maybe 10 years I believe. There was this huge shift when 'influencers' became a thing and people realized there was power in that for real.
Unfortunately a side effect of many HN readers having outsized influence on the AI and tech industry. Influence campaigns are much more valuable when run here.
It’s more disappointing that some HN users have zero awareness that sexual impropriety in the workplace is actually a really bad thing, and that being a great business leader does not excuse you from the consequences of being a bad person.
This is insane. Firing someone for their personal life choices instead of their professional life choices is absurd. The reporter that went after the second affair story was a proper misandrist too (as per reels) who had a history misandry in the past.
Jensen Huang getting caught with his pants down was not on my bingo card for how AI ponzi schemes will crash. This is the same guy and the same board that has been loaning peter to rent compute from paul who buys from them. ie circular financing juicing forward revenue.
It is baffling to read comments that this is excusable or he should be retained 'in interest of the shareholders'. Setting aside the obviously poor judgement, the appearance of impropriety has serious ammunition behind a situation that already looked weird. More practically, he's compromised now. Whether it's further scandal or the impending criminal investigations, there might be further hooks people have on him.
The quote about succession planning is also a little out of context, he phrased it more that there should be continual information and responsibility sharing such that succession planning is effectively redundant or unnecessary.
I always wondered why investors were ok with not having any control due to dual structure shares and board composition. A "Great Men" theory of the world is a convenient and satisfying narrative, but it's usually not the best at explaining things. As the saying goes, "The cemeteries are full of indispensable men".
People have a lot of net worth tied into the economy. Nvidia is a lynchpin in the economy. People are biased towards keeping their net worth up. It’s not that deep, people want the tendies to continue printing.
Yeah it is that deep. The second money is involved so many people are willing to look the other way. If you don't see an issue with that then you are clearly part of the problem.
I dont understand this argument, its either a shareholder concern or a criminal concern? a "conflict of interest" is a term used when a 3rd party needs to be unbiased ex government or law. You wouldn't say its a conflict of interest if your favourite sports team trades their best player
Which is exactly the right attitude to have. He's not a hollywood celeb, nor is he even a politician. He was involved in a private scandal, that doesn't compromise his ability to lead a company to profitability, no matter what I think of him a a person.
The market has reacted this way for a reason - Nvidia share prices fell a lot over the past few days.
If the espionage probe was serious (and it was known about in intelligence circles going back as much as a year), it would be handle much differently, with charges brought agains him or his company being sanctioned.
Person A having an affair with Person B when Person B is a direct report or directly within Person A's power in the company is a disqualification for leadership. Full stop. It is an abuse and shows that Person A is willing to abuse their position for personal gain. They cannot be trusted any longer.
Also irrelevant to the discussion at hand. Another powerful person wasn't punished while the woman he took advantage of was. That doesn't make this okay. It is a thing that happened and that we should strive to eliminate.
You're entitled to your opinion, and I'm not saying I disagree, but you should be aware that it's just an opinion. You're stating it as if it's some sort of objective fact.
Many people could just say the exact opposite of your sentence, i.e. "not a disqualification" and "can still be trusted". Furthermore, These people could supply many historical examples of leaders who did similar things and went on to remain great/effective leaders of the things they were charged to lead.
>> You're entitled to your opinion, and I'm not saying I disagree, but you should be aware that it's just an opinion. You're stating it as if it's some sort of objective fact.
It may not be a fact per se, but in the United States it is widely agreed upon that romantic relationships with subordinates is a big no-no from an ethics perspective (due to power dynamics and high potential for abuse), in addition to being a serious liability for the company.
When a manager has a romantic relationship with a subordinate they could, theoretically, show that employee favortism and/or make their work life miserable. Now any promotion or raise or privilege or punishment the employee receives is under scrutiny. Did the Manager have any say in it? Was another employee dismissed out of hand for the position because they passed on the manager's advances? All of this is a problem when the romantic relationship is known and on the level, when its an affair it is VERY problematic. The employees involved in the affair may sue for retaliation due to some circumstance, or another employee may sue because they feel they were passed over for a promotion or position. Others might have suspected something and been made to feel their job was in danger if they asked questions.
> with charges brought agains him or his company being sanctioned.
With a sane administration that hadn't possibly looked the other way due to emoluments (allegedly), maybe. Who knows what the response will be from the current mob (gentle pun intended).
Spoken like someone who puts all his eggs in something he has no control over. It's crazy how oblivious you are to this insane situation "investing" has become in this country. It's gambling. You don't control anything. You just hope for the best. It's all a house of cards.
The current DOJ is not a serious organization, so them not pursuing charges doesn’t really say anything
It’s also absurd that you’d think this is totally fine when the smart shareholders will be suing Nvidia for their malfeasance in evading export controls and incompetence in making sure their CEO doesn’t violate sexual harassment laws
I don't get it; why would shareholders sue for evading export controls? That was a profit-chasing move, that lead to a higher share price. It was not illegal either.
Also dating your coworker is not sexual harassment - sexual harassment is when you make unwelcome advances
> If the espionage probe was serious (and it was known about in intelligence circles going back as much as a year), it would be handle much differently, with charges brought agains him or his company being sanctioned.
My pet theory about why it was leaked is because the very serious reports were sent to the White House and they then did absolutely nothing about it. Just because this, wildly corrupt, current administration has not brought charges does not mean it won't happen in the future.
We're taught in school that ad hominem is a logical fallacy, but you know, sometimes it's not.
If someone holds NVDA, nothing out of their mouth about NVDA matters to me. Even if they're stating a fact, cool, I can find those from someone else. The only exception is if they're willing to double down after, then I'll listen.
A company is not required to maintain a look of propriety. A company is not required to not look fishy. A company is not required to care how it is observed by the public at large. It is required only to maximize shareholder value.
There is no doubt that his sexscapades were stupid, but at the same time there is only one question that should matter for the board. Will the shareholders make more money with him or without?
Maybe the board knows more than we do, but so far there is no public substantiation of these points. Obviously if he’s convicted, he can’t be CEO from jail, but why make company decisions a day after a new story broke?
Sure, of course they know more in the banal absolute sense.
But do they know more material information that we would all agree makes this not a hysterical witch hunt I don’t think we can be so confident about that.
Even if their information comes from American security personnel that should still be taken with the grain of salt.
“Modern corporate law does not require for-profit corporations to pursue profit at the expense of everything else, and many do not.”[0]
Supreme Court disagrees that a company is required “only required to maximize shareholder value”, do you have any evidence to support your claim otherwise?
This person does not have any evidence to support their claim. The notion that shareholder primacy is enshrined in settled law (when in fact, as you point out, the opposite is true) is widely believed in the HN comments pages.
Shareholder primacy at the expense of everything else is a ridiculous and relatively new idea. There is no reason that it has to be that way other than that Milton Friedman thought it was a good optimization problem.
I find it interesting to see so much blame being directed at the act of removing one person who may have been holding up trillions of value in the stock market, rather than at the market and industry conditions that led to so much value being supported by one person in the first place.
This guy had a cult of personality I did not know about until this comment thread.
"He created so much shareholder value."
"Unlike Elon he shared the wealth with the company."
"The US is worse off without him."
I'm sorry but a patsy who is this gullible, or a CCP-friendly traitor that is this slimy (the jury is still out), should not be in this position of power.
Cool for all he accomplished so far. This isn't a situation that deserves a second chance.
Not everyone believes in the idea of nations or national security.
I don’t care one whit who he sells chips to, or who he’s fucking when he’s not selling those chips. The US government’s geopolitical agenda is not my geopolitical agenda.
> baffling to read comments that this is excusable or he should be retained 'in interest of the shareholders'
If you want Exhibit A for the moral corruption of Silicon Valley’s culture, this is it. And it’s not tied to shareholdings. It’s the quasi-monarchic strain of worship that has been poisoning Valley culture for at least a decade now.
I mean the guy had an affair. Or two. Or more. Not cool and that one turned out to be a Chinese spy makes it quite impactful. But from a pure "moral corruption" standpoint this is not worse than your average college frat house.
The affair(s) were tied to skirting export bans. The moral corruption is bigger than Nvidia because it seems Trump administration was involved. Laws shouldn't be applied selectively like this.
One of the greatest fallacies of modern times is that people are not human. There is this expectation that people will be perfect and flawless and make zero mistakes. That is incongruent with human nature. The dude had two consensual relationships outside his marriage. To err is human... this is all so overblown.
Meanwhile we have a felon in the white house (sexual assault) among an immeasurable number of other supposed crimes
This isn’t a unique situation. When your error is sleeping with a subordinate, you get fired. That’s universally true in the corporate world. No reason this should be any different from the countless times it’s happened before.
"Appearance of impropriety". Fuck all you puritans.
Ah yes. Being gay disqualified you from security clearance. Why? Because if you are gay, then you can be blackmailed. Why? Because you might lose your security clearance.
Interesting that 18% of Nvidia's revenue comes from their 2020 Mellanox buyout. Might rank among YouTube as one of the most profitable corporate buyouts ever.
About their new interim CEO Colette Kress:
>'She starts her day talking with Israeli execs because Nvidia's major Israel operations (post-Mellanox acquisition, ~6k staff, ~18% of revenue via networking chips) are business-critical'
Jensen bought Mellanox for $7B in 2020. In Q2 2026 it generated $17.5B in revenue or ~18% of Nvidia's total revenue.
The problem i see is that I dont see anyone who is suitable to be a ceo of Nvidia. It’s a special blend of hardware and software chops that no other CEO has imo.
Very very few HW CEOs have even the slightest ability to appreciate the key strength of Nvidia which is ability to build hardware and then drive it with outstanding software.
Look at AMD. Great hardware but hamstrung by their software for 20 years.
Funny how that perspective completely changed because CUDA ended up being a better idea than initially anticipated, while the need for well-designed and -maintained linux graphics drivers.. somehow subsided? (my nvidia drivers still deadlock way too often)
And is it going to get cheaper to build data centers?
Nvidia was/is such a fundamental cog in the american ai economy/ machine, what spies, what cheating are people obsessed about? Nvidia created the capital for its own success; read about it, think about it, be against it, be for it. The capital did not exist, they created it by neoclouds buying hardware which they wouldnt need for two years ahead by lender and vendor-backed financing; hardware, which would be replaced in another 2-4 years.
Will nVidia continue to provide the same backing to neo-clouds? Without nVidia backing are lenders willing to give more or less?
Forget about chinese openweight models, antropic or oai, I see this development as a huge spanner in the us ai economy, maybe the biggest blunder of the year, the biggest own goal if it came from within the us administration under or without guidance.
And finally: Jensen selling to the chinese iron. Okay, was he the only one, god amongst mortals, in the fricking room. Who the heck comes up with these shallow plots...
"We had a situation where somebody was reported to us to be doing something bad with AI. We called them very strongly and said get ready to go to jail."
Wish the interviewer would have let him talk more instead of changing the subject.
Huang/Nvidia = House Atreides
Lisa Su/AMD = House Harkonnen
GPUs = Sandworms
US Govt = The Emperor/House Corrino
Smugging GPUs to China = Smuggling Sandworms off planet to try and break the spice monopoly
This event = some stuff that happens in book 2/ movie part 3
Stuff
Personally I am not a fan of companies being moral arbiters, or company's reputation and such be the organizing axis around which we decide whether a person has the right to a livelihood, companies after all are not people. Though Jensen is insulated from economic security concerns, for any other "normal" person, the coercive power of a corporate with it's army of lawyers can effectively ruin a person's life.
Whether one deserves such ruination is a moral matter, and everyone is entitled to their own judgement, but it seems wrong to concentrate such power in a private for-profit entity. The entire basis of anti-fascist doctrine is infringement of individual liberties and modern societies, while mostly conditioned to be against government coercion are remarkably comfortable with corporate coercion, dressed up in the pretty language of compliance and organizational reputation. A company is an economic entity, not a moral entity. It is fine with being a moral entity when it comes to matters of its own reputation and operations, but conveniently becomes an economic entity when it is time for layoffs. Ultimately, it comes down to who has a bigger stick
The thing is an organization is not just a place where you work; it is a provider of economic security, livelihood, and dignity. This concentrates extraordinary power in your place of employment; you are to clock in 5 days a week for at least 8 hours a week; and then work in a highly locked down corporate machine, which you are not allowed to customize even though this is where you will spend the majority of your week in, and one has to ask the question to what extent a company owns your life.
I think that we must also identify the cultural contradiction here; where Hollywood and the like in a sense glorify promiscuity and depict wealth as flaunted with assets and women, as a cultural ideal, and then turn around and hound creatures who are products of such a culture.
Of course, in this case it is far more likely that Jensen was involved with some national security incident.
I feel this is a hasty and suicidal move for the company, and for the American AI chip industry as a whole, esp. when they haven't figured out a transition plan.
I was telling yall I knew something was off with nvidia when they had those remote controlled “lets pretend they are ai” Disney robots on stage - I was like that’s not cricket.
Am I the only one who feels this is a smear piece to oust Jenson to retain optics?
Outside of the continued selling to China/skirting the export ban I’m of the belief that he was offered a better deal in China, took it, then signaled he was departing, the timing on this seems…suspect.
Recalling the May POTUS and CEO field trip to china, the lot returned together with Jenson extending his stay nearly two weeks afterwards.
IMO this ongoing theatre provides cover to oust Jenson and vilify him before he appears somewhere in China —- imagine how the share price would fair if it came to light that he was leaving as CEO to take a position in Huawei…
Exactly. People are acting like this is some conspiracy or a woke move or something. When it seems pretty likely he just broke the law while acting as CEO and they're trying to get ahead of it.
There's huge risk in firing a very successful CEO without anyone ready to replace him.
No one really cares about the affairs, so I think the only thing that could push the board do this would be the threat of more damaging stuff coming out, like nVidia skirting the China ban, or a legal threat to Jensen that envelops the company. Or back-channel pressure from the US Gov.
I would honestly love to hear why you think there is anybody at all working for or invested in Anthropic who is capable of orchestrating a coup against one of the most well capitalized companies on the planet AND a supplier partner that poses an existential risk to Anthropic itself (per their S-1) in the way of spending commitments and ability to procure compute capacity.
I don't need to hear why you think they did it. I'm already familiar with the "why" behind this crazy theory. I would like to know how you think it's possible they did this.
Banging Chinese Spies presents a conflict of interest the Board cannot overlook.
Banging 1000 women while married is Chinese "Boss" behavior.
The cause and effect is that any and all future CEOs caught in a honeypot will be easier to compromise. Xi loves the news. Nerds with one billion dollars hoping to attain unlimited groupies will need proper Hollywood Handlers. HR for whore intake if you will. Until the sex robots arrive.
Since this company has abandoned gamers for AI. Plus allegedly giving away a few million plus chips (gamers get fucked) to China. I am fully on his wife's side. She was there at the beginning.
Luckily we know that American courts are one sided. Making the upcoming divorce more costly then the Bill Gate's Foundation implosion. What's the over/under divorce cost trending on Polymarket right now? Seems undervalued.
None of them are able to put two and two together that this was a deliberate coup
And it seems like nobody is paying attention to what Jensen Huang was fighting for. He was against regulation of open source local models. He was against regulation shifting liability of local model developers as well as frontier models.
All in all without Jensen, it isn't just about NVIDIA, there's no one to champion for open source models and running them locally is going to get a lot harder and expensive. It's actually going to accelerate the monopolization of closed models and they will have to pass on the costs to consumers.
It's an L across the board and I'm noting the degraded quality of discourse on HN and that nobody is seeing through the veil here.
Jensen Huang was against regulation of open models because he was *for* selling GPUs. He was so for it, he might have helped an Alibaba corporate cutout launder a bunch of them against US trade regulations.
You may think that's a ridiculous bigger picture, but that's the bigger picture I'm looking at. I think your bigger picture of, "this is an inside-the-industry coup to remove the one champion of open weights models," is even more ridiculous.
Both of these notwithstanding, what makes you believe nvidia's new permanent CEO won't also be a champion for open weights? An open weights ecosystem is better for their business long term.
I was hoping we wouldn't return to woke witch hunts
If this was about national security or evading the law, it would have happened when it was discovered.
The board didn't have the determination either to fire him or to protect him, and he realized they wouldn't be able to make a decision, so he did it for them.
Now we'll see yet another jewel taken over by bean counters because the board was so dependent.
Let's hope other founders have boards who can actially handle their responsibilities.
>Huang, Nvidia's fourth-largest shareholder with a stake of about 3.61%
This was the founder? Damn!
I get that hardware requires much more capital and investment than a pure software company, but he had crossed the board-being-able-to-fire-you rubicon looong ago
Stuff like this is why AI automation is going to come faster than people think.
Invariably it will be recognized that the weakest link in any part of any organizations are the humans. Humans once had a monopoly on long-term strategic thinking so capital had to confer them authority and compensation, but once AI supersedes humans in these respects, then the human element will be aggressively excised from any company where human flaws put the strength and compettive advantage of that company at risk.
A robot employee never has affairs, never sleeps, never needs worker's compensation for injury, never sues the company. When trillions of dollars are on the line, eliminating risks like this is a trivial decision.
If you're controlled by your greed, yes. But human beings are relational. Half the reason I go to work is to talk and relate to my coworkers.
I know some people have AI girlfriends, but most people are not willing to (nor do I think they should) make that jump to trying to relate to their robot coworker.
I hope it's the same for people making a company. If not, we are heading towards a very lonely world.
You're assuming that the economy isn't driven by profit.
Of course there will be the minority of artisanal companies that accept the lovable flaws of fellow humans, but they will not be profitable, will not drive growth, and will not inherit the capital future. A market economy will sell to the highest bidder, and the buyer which has more money because it aggressively pursued the most efficient option at every opportunity will invariably be the highest bidder.
Right, because MegaSpeed is a Singapore-based company. Now that company may have channeled those chips to China, but officially Nvidia was not responsible for that unless it is proven that they knew about it. Investigations are ongoing but seems there is no concrete evidence for either the first or second part yet.
I would agree, and even Nvidia if it can be proven that they knew about this. But my point is that so far it hasn’t been shown, yet people are assuming it as fact.
* Megaspeed was evading US sanctions against China
* Megaspeed CEO was a Chinese state agent
* Huang was sleeping with Megaspeed CEO
Therefore, one of the following must be true:
(1) [Unlikely] Huang knowingly supported the evasion of sanctions. If so, he should be fired for breaking the law.
(2) Huang was tricked. If so, his judgement is now suspect.
Huang's argument is (2). In this case, the evalaution of his judgement is:
(A) Is this a one-off mistake? If so, he should be retained - he's human.
(B) Is this a pattern? If so, he should be fired - he's an ongoing risk (e.g., via regulatory action).
Huang resigned because the second affair indicated (B) - he's an ongoing risk.
As a result, the question of "who knew what when" is actually beside the point. Retaining Huang risks ongoing, overwhelming government action for evading sanctions - and the board members want 0 personal liability in that investigation.
US sanction law seems to be really scary. Everyone is scared of it.
I used to work at a company where the sanction was around something mundane like Excel or something, and we had to make it an urgent priority to ban all users from Russia to access ... spinning the wheel ... our spreadsheet functionality.
My co-workers and I found it funny that US decided to ban Russia from using an online Excel-like functionality.
From three allegations, you can't say anything is true. We do know that one of the allegations is true (they were having sex), but that doesn't really tell us much.
If Huang is compromised, a national security risk and must go what are the implications of knowingly flying said national security risk on AF-1? Is it a pattern?
(1) [Unlikely] Huang knowingly supported the evasion of sanctions. If so, he should be fired for breaking the law.
(2) Huang was tricked. If so, his judgement is now suspect.""
No - it's absolutely not a choice between those two things and neither are likely.
A company bought some chips from Nvidia - and illegally moved some to China.
That's it.
Jenson knows many of Nvidias customers. Probably thousands.
He's not 'tricked' because he doesn't have some magical 'judge of character' - the insinuation is preposterous.
--> Companies do illegal stuff all the timee; this one was skirting export laws.
That's it.
He's not a mind reader, and she's probably not a spy either, I'm sure she told the CCP some things because that's how it works in China, just as US citizens tell US gov a lot of things as well.
Ultimately he bears some responsibility, and there's enough concern to look into it, but this is Occam's Razor - the lady was back door shipping gear, just as thousands of business do.
Just as more than 50% of the materials in Russian cruise missiles are 'made in USA' - and illegal 'smuggled' into Russia, and by 'smuggled' I mean sent in the regular mail.
I encourage you to browse some of the BIS settlements and court cases to learn how these things go. Simple diversion is quite literally the least sophisticated approach to circumventing EAR. This entire scheme was blatantly obvious, and under a different administration it wouldn’t have happened at all.
What do you expect Nvidia to do, post armed guards in Asia to make sure the GPUs don't move around? He sold to an eligible entity. Unless he had foreknowledge they were planning to smuggle the chips, he shouldn't have any responsibility for what happens to them.
For real. And if the US government assumed MegaSpeed's executive was a Chinese spy for the past year, then why didn't they do anything to stop this or add MegaSpeed to export controls? The whole thing wreaks.
I have a pretty easy answer for that. I bet all the money Jensen donated to Trump might have something to do with it. And my suspicion is that someone that doesn't like to do look the other way when someone is colluding with China might have blown the cover on this, let's say Marco Rubio that has presidential ambitions (it will never happen, but still he really wants to).
That would be a much more convincing argument if he didn't have an affair with an executive there who is also a spy. My guess is he did know, the board knows he knows. At least. Helping facilitate the smuggling wouldn't be totally crazy either given these circumstances and his public positions.
Believe it or not, companies are legally required to do due diligence on such things. For example, I work for a huge bank and when there's even the faintest hint of money possibly being funneled through an intermediary to a sanctioned state/person or a company on the Entities List they will absolutely send someone to investigate. Physically, if it is deemed necessary.
A multi-billion dollar deal in Singapore would absolutely require some folks to physically go out there and do some inventory at the very least. It needs to be in the realm of, "We walked the data center and counted how many of our products were installed and we were shown their yet-installed inventory" documentation. "It matches what we sold them." A great big, fancy report. With pictures.
How much would that cost? Basically nothing compared to how much trouble they could get in for not doing that due diligence. Compare how much it would've cost against how much their stock just dropped.
There’s a thing called know you customer (KYC) law. You can in fact be held liable if you can’t prove you sufficiently vetted a customer before engaging in a transaction with them. Saying that you’re right there’s only so much they can do after vetting.
> What do you expect Nvidia to do, post armed guards in Asia to make sure the GPUs don't move around?
I expect them to follow the law, which, in this case, appears to be a bit more complex than "you can't sell to china but it's okay if you sell to someone else who sells to china."
Not to mention the fact that he was sleeping with the Megaspeed exec makes it all extremely suspicious.
Affairs don't take down CEOs of major public companies. It's kind of assumed that they all do it. Like, how many subordinates of Elon supposedly had one of his kids?
Everyone involved has to be CYAing. It's pretty likely that a whole boatload of people were involved and none of them want to be the scapegoat that gets to go to jail for it. If they can sell this as something as simple as Jensen getting tricked by a cute spy, then everyone involved can sleep easy and Jensen will probably keep controlling things behind the scenes for a while.
My guess is that someone knew this and leaked it because they also have insider information that Nvidia is about to be forced to write down the AI trade anyways and they 1) don't want Jensen walking away with a golden parachute and/or 2) want to use the spectacle of Jensen's infidelity to color the narrative or distract from something.
lol reading comprehension isn't your main skill is it? maybe you can readmaxx or learnmaxx or trymaxx to understandmaxx what the fuckmaxx your talkingmaxx about
Your allegations are unfounded.
No one but a few people really know what was going on, and one certainty is that the current us administration isn’t going to take the blame for it.
Jensen's job as a CEO was to generate revenue. He was doing "sales" using the reverse-honeypot strategy. He got the chips sold, they were permitted by Lutnick, he came home, shook hands with daddy Trump. My god, what a way to create shareholder value. The revelations of the other indiscretions were the 2nd and 3rd wave assaults in case he was withering the 1st attack of the classic tried and true "alleged spy lover" offensive. The drip drip leaks (NYT+WSJ+FT we see you) were timed after the midterms when it became clear that Trump had no more linebackers to defend the line. Jensen had no fighting chance at that point.
Everybody has a responsibility to uphold rule of law in any democracy. I'm tired of the narrative that U.S. companies are helpless entities that can only seek profit at the expense of everybody else. Ok then, if it was profitable to wipe out the entire planet with a nuclear war (Vault-tech) would you be fine with a company doing so?
I have seen several references to Huang's stance on Open Models, and there is apparently nothing below board with exports. Is there a chance (within reason, I don't mean conspiracy theory) his ouster was orchestrated? Let's call the affair a "convenient excuse" because from what I've seen in my time on earth, a CEO's private indiscretions aren't always enough to result in a termination.
tl;dr - how much of this might be motivated about internal politics and board views vs. CEO views ?
I'm probably failing to see enough nuance here, but isn't Nvidia taking a hit a good thing when they are basically a monopoly? It seems to me like unintentional self-inflicted anti-trust regulation. Nvidia's failure is another chip maker's opportunity. And it's not like Nvidia is going to instantly implode and take the stock market down with it. It would take the form of slowly losing market share as their products become less appealing for whatever reason, assuming the decline would happen under new leadership at all. Then we get real competition in the GPU market.
From all the readings so far, it does not look like he knew he was under the spell of a honeypot, nor nvidia knowingly sold the chips in question, directly to china. The truth will come out one day, and it is might be an uphill battle to prove a criminal intent from Jensen.
On a more mundane level, since he can neither go to office, nor to the house, any guesses what his routine will be over next couple weeks? Not a perfect example, but for some reason, this reminds me of the last scene in Fargo where WH Macy gets holed up in a motel buying time.
It's bizarre to me how many people here seem to seriously believe this is actually about cheating on his wife. It seems pretty clear that this is related to the glaringly obvious, continued export of GPUs to China, expressly violating an export ban. Combine that with having an affair with a woman who just so happens to be integral to the smuggling operation. It just looks too bad. Opens Nvidia up to a world of hurt once the dems take over in January, and Huang himself to serious criminal charges. And that's just the stuff that's public information. We have to assume the board knows more than us.
This stuff has probably been going on behind the scenes for a while. The leak about the affair is just the catalyst that accelerated it all.
As in they’d have to let him go anyway, same as the Coldplay concert guy. The dollar value of the legal liability is not as relevant as the reputational and stock price hit they’d take
I doubt any GPUs were sold to China because of this woman.
China just needed her to sleep with Jensen, so they could get him fired. Nvidia is at a loss without him. Knock Nvidia down a peg.
If China wanted more Nvidia GPUs you really think sexy spy was their strategy? You think China is upset right now they lost their sexy spy? No, this went all according to plan for China - Jensen is gone, and a weaker Nvidia remains.
This is like Apple losing Jobs. The company remains, but the vision is gone.
With thousands of subordinate and a board of directors above him - you really think Jensen could sneak thousand of GPUs anywhere? You really think an old billionaire in a fast paced industry has time for those types of games?
>>> seem to seriously believe this is actually about cheating on his wife
Sleeping with subordinates exposes the company to risk from employment-related lawsuits. He'd be in just as much trouble if he'd done that while single.
It speaks to Huang's actual work performance. His seemingly sole value proposition was talking; his customers originally identified a gpu's utility in AI.
yeah, I think he is way more than that, CUDA exista because he refused to concede to shareholders pressure, the whole GPU release cadence compressed to 6 months with Jepsen and the whole stack of datacenter technology to connect those GPUs didn't happen by mistake either
Jepsen survived in an industry of failures, he is an incredibly talented CEO
This smells like a hit job on Jensen Huang. Years from now, it'll probably come out that Alice Huang wasn't a spy for China and the whole Kimberly affair was a setup. Of course, by then, no one will care about the truth.
On Nov 8th, the board stated that "no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised".
OK, looks like this spy story was not power enough (as we do not have evidence), let's use another one: an internal affair. Maybe two lies will do the job.
One thing which isn't adding up to me. Everyone is breathlessly reporting that in the past three years (or whatever) megaspeed obtained $7.5B in nvidia chips. Nvidia's revenue is about $6B per week. If the fear is that China's AI research is catching up due to those chips, which seems like a percent of nvidia's production, does that mean China's researchers are so efficient they only need that 1%, or does it mean they are getting a lot more AI compute through other channels?
Law and adultery are so obviously irrelevant here, besides being used as kompromat. That's a pretty transparent and well timed punishment for disloyalty and a corporate+state coup of one group against another, there's zero doubt about that. I wonder if anyone who commented "oh it's just China doing Chinese things" on Jack Ma back in the day will ever notice (ironic) parallels with Huang. Detestable.
I think a lot of people here seem to underestimate how much of a CEO's job is perception.
"Oh who cares who he slept with, he's been great for Nvidia. Nothing has been proven."
He's one of the most visible CEO's in the most visible industry in the world, and the entire AI economy is dependent upon them. The perception of him as stable is incredibly important.
Merely the suggestion that he is having affairs with people with close ties to China's government, given export controls, is a huge PR problem. Adding in an additional affair with someone under him. And the likelihood that there may be even more out there.
I doubt the Board wants to get rid of Jensen Huang. He's done incredibly well for them. But right now, there's a huge PR shitstorm swirling around the company.
Maybe in six months it all dies down and he comes back, who knows. But right now, you really can't just ignore the problem and hope the media doesn't care about the whole "well she was only sort of a spy" situation.
> I think a lot of people here seem to underestimate how much of a CEO's job is perception.
What a load of crap. Elon Musk is deranged and nobody bats an eye. Zuck is proven to steal and sell data illegally for political gains in authoritative countries with Cambridge analytica and nobody cares. This guy has 2 affairs and is out.
I am sure lots can be said on this topic (what the hell was Jensen doing!); others will say it, but I want to add that expectation management and posturing is very important in this age.
Musk and Zuck both have far more voting power in their companies than Jensen Huang does in Nvidia. Zuck specifically has effectively unilateral control.
Not sure why you're being downvoted. This shit is so commonplace and well-known regarding the elites and CEO's. It should've been priced in anyways.
My theory is the rest of the oligarchy was getting scared of NVIDIA's stranglehold on AI development and the broader economy and felt they needed to knock Huang and the company down a peg or two. Maybe install a bit of a crony CEO (a la Tim Apple).
And Elon sleeps with every woman possible going so far as building a Texas compound for these women and children. If Musk were to sleep with a Chinese spy his excuse would simply be she was ovulating at the time.
When the share price is at max max any slight crosswind is going to knock it hard too. And this is a big one because a trifecta of scandal, the spy thing and him being ousted and so that brain and leadership and image being lost. Wouldn't be so bad on a value share probably (I invest in another scandal ridden CEO stock so I know the drill!)
With the recent midterm / AI crash, I'll leave this stock well alone. Might buy at sub 100 if panic sets in.
Many leaders and engineers at Nvida are multi-millionaires many times over, they don't need to be there, they love the culture, vision and leadership. With Jensen gone, that could all change. I'm sure many employees are looking at the exit now.
Right, it's alleged spy. We don't even know if she's actually a spy yet, but people are already talking about it like it's a definite thing. What happened to innocent until proven guilty? Places like reddit are notorious for putting heads on a spike on just allegations (eg. Depp v. Heard)
Oh come on. Everyone knows these tech CEOs are distasteful humans, people just buy from them because they have little competition (from fellow evil tech CEOs).
The CEO's personality is irrelevant if they're selling something that's in high enough demand. Money matters more than anything.
This particular scandal is an issue for Nvidia because:
1. Actual espionage, national security, etc. is potentially in play - criminal charges cost money.
2. Liability from potential lawsuits around in-office affairs - civil suits cost money.
That's the question, isn't it. It's easy enough to armchair quarterback and say that, as a man, I'm not that distasteful, and that I wouldn't do that, but I haven't been put in that position before. I can pretend to be the most pious, on the other side of my keyboard over the Internet, but, honestly, I haven't actually been sitting in that (bed)room as a billionaire against a woman who's motivated to get me to do her bidding. I can say all I want about what I would do, but that's all just hot air.
Firing one the world's smartest men that built one of the most valuable companies just because he had consensual sex with a woman he wasn't married with.
It seems whenever something like this happens to high profile, or deep pockets theres a bunch of additional folks who appear, some (maybe all) whom are just opportunists.
People also just tell more open to talking once the news is public.
When you are the first person to call the ceo a sexual opportunist, you take all the risks. When you’re second third, it’s easier, you’re just one more person.
I feel this could be a chess move by OAI/Anthropic/AWS etc to get Chinese companies stop open source models and get hands on all Nvidia Chips. This real estate race is getting dirty.
Could this be it? Are these fuckers worried about their incentives being misaligned where Anthropic would love to stop open weight models in the US and NVIDIA has incentives to beat Apple at the local AI game.
This could turn out to be the best thing for AI. I hope Jensen starts a new startup and challenges NVDIA. This will enable more options of GPU for end users and break NVIDIA monopoly.
He will never do this. His family is so embedded in Nvidia that he may as well be handing over a kingdom at this point. He might go on to do other kinds of related things, or maybe he will buy an island and vanish, who knows. But, he will never compete with Nvidia.
Huang is the classic example of an entrepreneur who grew up and came of age at the end of the Cold War, at the height of globalization and the Pax Americana: focused mainly on business, with no obligation to take sides for any national interest. Unfortunately, those days are over, and, reluctant to fully adapt, he has paid the price.
The smuggling and romance details that have been exposed so far are either well known or immaterial to the business. So why the crazy urgency now?
Perhaps some influential folks want to support Anthropic's IPO by showing that the open source models will soon be blunted/outlawed, but IPO-ing into a crash seems like a high price for that moat.
Or do similarly influential folks want to tank AI as a whole but couldn't politically afford a crash before mid-terms?
It's amazing to see the people cheering on Jensen's resignation as if it's not the death knell for open models..especially on a forum that prides itself on open source, what a slap in the face and a compromise of the forums values.
rvz | 10 hours ago
Jensen Huang gone as President, CEO, and a member of the Board of Nvidia, effective immediately.
The Nvidia coup operation has been completed. It is over.
rayiner | 10 hours ago
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
rvz | 9 hours ago
The AI labs do not want any of that and there is one that certainly has never released an open weight model.
You can take a good guess on the sort of people that are also associated with that AI lab.
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
Levitz | 7 hours ago
This proves that not selling to China was a good idea, and throws into question every narrative pointing otherwise. It also should make it evident that yes, China is most certainly spreading propaganda regarding these points, there's just no way it's not happening.
protocolture | an hour ago
Who cares. You cant poke it in anyone in Silicon Valley who isnt informing to someone. Mostly Stratfor but still.
cannonpalms | 9 hours ago
verdverm | 9 hours ago
automatic6131 | 10 hours ago
LLMs will be completely unaffected, but the pricing remains to be seen.
chinathrow | 9 hours ago
nicce | 9 hours ago
LarryDarrell | 9 hours ago
Implicated | 10 hours ago
hexad74 | 10 hours ago
dyauspitr | 9 hours ago
mcmcmc | 2 hours ago
dyauspitr | 53 minutes ago
mcmcmc | 37 minutes ago
dyauspitr | 13 minutes ago
proc0 | 10 hours ago
sixo | 9 hours ago
dralley | 9 hours ago
But I imagine the billions of dollars in illicit sales is considered a bigger issue.
stann | 9 hours ago
HatchedLake721 | 9 hours ago
piva00 | 9 hours ago
The cheating is just a bit of humiliation, the damning part is the knowingly circumvention of export controls.
proc0 | 9 hours ago
qsymmachus | 9 hours ago
conartist6 | 9 hours ago
The news made it sound like she was a sophisticated person using him as a simpleton, but if anything he was using her to move his products against sanctions.
233mhz | 9 hours ago
And a lot of other shady things around nvidia, half of it we probably will never know about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1H3xQaf7BFI
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-administration-jail-le...
jagermo | 9 hours ago
reedf1 | 9 hours ago
knorker | 9 hours ago
And that was only with a subordinate, not a subordinate AND with a foreign spy (alleged). Reports say China got billions in chips imported thanks to this operation.
Politicians also drop like flies. The only person impervious to consequences has been Trump. None of his supporters care that he's the devil.
qsymmachus | 9 hours ago
baggachipz | 9 hours ago
epolanski | 9 hours ago
The point is that as CEO of a company you have a fiduciary duty to have the best interest of a company in your actions and behavior.
Having sex with your workers and chinese spies is obviously not the kind of behavior that reflects that.
And if companies did not fire their CEOs over such blatant missteps the wrong message would be sent to the whole corporate America.
It sucks because obviously Nvidia would be nowhere without Jensen, and it's not like he killed someone or committed fraud, but the mistakes have been huge none the less.
And don't forget that those are the two cases we know about, but when you see 2 ants in your kitchen there's always more.
And the internal investigation of Nvidia quickly assessed that the issue was bigger and Jensen was more of a liability than an asset.
officeplant | 9 hours ago
We're just gonna keep shoving the illegal GPU trade with China under the rug I guess.
epolanski | 9 hours ago
But yes, the fact that Nvidia advocated for relaxing exports to China and that he sold billions of GPUs to shady Singaporean companies is now obviously under major scrutiny.
kilroy123 | 9 hours ago
mrguyorama | 5 hours ago
You want leaders to be held accountable? Look, a leader who clearly made bad and dumb and wrong choices, and a simple opportunity to celebrate them facing accountability. Can you support that?
twodave | 9 hours ago
vinyl7 | 9 hours ago
The jury is still out on this, re the circular financing mess with AI
origini | 9 hours ago
We don't know his relationship with his wife, what their stands on cheating even stands.
You can argue its an image issue, but thats a problem of the press and marketing and not that he might have cheated.
His wife is an adult and is for sure not poor, so its not a situation were she has to stay with him.
I do believe it either has to do with the whole spy story or he did something he really shouldn't have.
epolanski | 9 hours ago
I said that the missteps was having sex with subordinates and chinese spies.
Now start connecting the dots with Nvidia being one of the major advocates for relaxing exports to China and selling billions of GPUs to shady Singaporean companies that the chinese spy represented and you understand why the board finds him a liability.
coldtea | 9 hours ago
Mashimo | 9 hours ago
Suspect by payment from ... TenCent? AFAIK. Her company got money from Tencent and after every longer meeting with Jensen, someone from Tencent flew in and had a meeting with her. At least that is what I remember hearing.
coldtea | 9 hours ago
Was Alice's company supposed to be the only company getting Nvidia chips (which they deny doing anyway). Or one of many and Chinese companies did it with many different others?
If many, why is her relationship specifically important or special from that aspect?
Again, I can understand snooping for confidential early information from him. But "she got with him so that this single company gets chips"?
origini | 7 hours ago
"Having sex with your workers and chinese spies is obviously not the kind of behavior that reflects that."
Fair though you didn't say cheating, but it undermined (at least by reading it) the main argument you brought up later regarding chinese spies
epolanski | 4 hours ago
origini | 2 hours ago
KaiserPro | 9 hours ago
ungovernableCat | 9 hours ago
I think both nvidia AND jensen will be doing quite fine 5 years from now.
usrme | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
OtherShrezzing | 9 hours ago
k12sosse | 5 hours ago
numpad0 | 9 hours ago
bar8uyr | 9 hours ago
DonHopkins | 9 hours ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BUDwj_mXKE
bar8uyr | 8 hours ago
skywal_l | 9 hours ago
sevenzero | 9 hours ago
manojlds | 9 hours ago
dreadsword | 9 hours ago
And: the public only knows what's made it out. Who knows what else has come out in private.
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
fuussssip | 9 hours ago
zarzavat | 8 hours ago
fuussssip | 5 hours ago
Go forth and consensually bang your coworkers. Knock yourselves out.
When you have the ability to fire or promote someone, however, you hold significant power over their life -- potentially impacting their ability to eat, house themselves, etc. In those cases, it's valid to ask, "Is there a possibility someone is being coerced into sex because they can't afford to say no?"
This is question of consent. It's not an allegation of rape. It's only a question and there are probably times the answer is no.
You don't have to knee jerk react to someone pointing out an obvious potential conflict of interest and go "so everything is rape now?"
4ndrewl | 9 hours ago
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
Officials are corrupted? CEOs sleeping with other women including his subordinates? Snow is white? What's the deal? People at that level are basically playing politics, not laws.
However, the fact that someone decided to release all those information as PUBLIC, and followed that up with ANOTHER scandal, means that they are determined to get rid of them. As you said, it is indeed serious matter.
As the Chineses say: "Something weights as light as a quarter of pound if it's left alone, but can weight a thousand tons if put on the scale".
verdverm | 9 hours ago
The problem is that you don't think it is a problem. It goes on because there are no consequences.
Maybe in '29 the Epstein perps will actually be prosecuted
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
If we (the common people) really want consequences, we will need to do a LOT more and put things in our own hands instead of relying on our representatives -- oh but that's too populist for HN's taste.
verdverm | 8 hours ago
I'm with you on the first half, and see the second half changing. The fever may have broken in the US electorate.
twodave | 9 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | 5 hours ago
mcmcmc | 3 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | an hour ago
twodave | 2 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | an hour ago
twodave | 32 minutes ago
baggy_trough | 9 hours ago
jetrink | 9 hours ago
ZeroGravitas | 9 hours ago
Otherwise you end up thinking "should I start an affair with this Chinese spy I've been breaking US laws with? What are they going to do, fire me? They can't, I've got them trapped so I'm untouchable, I can do whatever I want. And if I'm in a helicopter crash then it sucks to be them, I'll not care when I'm dead".
igleria | 9 hours ago
well, yeah.
tartuffe78 | 9 hours ago
Conspiracy reaction: Something is going on here... obviously not due to sleeping with a spy...
ksec | 9 hours ago
Waiting to see how market reacts, I am selling my shares.
Dear Jensen, time to start another company.
And if you believe in conspiracy theory, I guess anthropic is very happy.
liuliu | 9 hours ago
No, the alternative is not to “not having affairs”. Remember, we don’t need evidence to spin a narrative.
hackyhacky | 9 hours ago
Except that we have evidence in this case: he literally admitted to the affair. I don't see any "spin."
liuliu | 9 hours ago
duplessitous | 9 hours ago
From all the reporting I've read, it is hard for me to avoid the conclusion that NVIDIA sold to China despite the export ban. I'd love to be wrong
lesuorac | 9 hours ago
So it’s no longer about national security. What changed now compared to 2 years ago to make Trump care? Did Jenson reduce SpaceX’s allocation?
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
CodingJeebus | 9 hours ago
We all now know that Trump knew about it, that's what has changed. It was fine when this was private, but now his administration is starting to get questions around why his Commerce department punted the initial investigation to DOJ where it ultimately died as the opposition party is about to retake Congress with investigations top of mind.
jsw97 | 9 hours ago
Likely there was at least a feeling of mutual understanding between Jensen and key people in the administration. Now the wind has turned in a big way and none of that is on paper. And in fact what is on paper points in the wrong direction.
Probably the only thing protecting NVDA from prosecution right now is that nobody in the White House wants to pop the AI bubble. That might protect Jensen too because he would entangle the company. There will be an interesting tension with congressional oversight. Buy popcorn and NVDA vol.
cogman10 | 9 hours ago
It's hard to believe the US government was so incompetent that they didn't do the investigation a YouTuber did (But not impossible).
The export ban was always BS. Unless you are going to do a total ban and all parts are manufactured in the US, then it is just 1 additional hop to get stuff into China.
lenerdenator | 9 hours ago
Part of me is hopeful after this. Huang did something that was, at the very least, profoundly stupid, and just short of treason at worst. However, I'm also filled with dread, because I know that this means that there will be even more of an effort by founders to make sure they're immune from consequences from boards if they go public. You already see this at Meta and with Zuckerberg.
We need real reforms on corporate governance that make this sort of situation - a board able to control the C-suite - the norm, not the exception.
gib444 | 9 hours ago
That's literally how the world works? And has worked for many centuries or longer. By "value" you mean wealth, and wealthy people can get away with murder. They buy and write the law and have the best lawyers in the world.
We won't have billionaires/trillionaires/kings AND rule of law for /everyone/ equally - the world doesn't work that way.
anon291 | 8 hours ago
retwakm4 | 3 hours ago
That being said, I think resigning yourself to this sort of behavior because "muh power and world works this way" is just kind of stupid. It is not in your best interests, as a regular person much like the vast majority of HN posters (besides the AI shill bots), to just be content with that state of affairs, if there are little things that are relatively effective at reducing those kinds of corruptions of social systems.
One of those things happens to be general distaste of an authentically Christian society against hedonistic behavior, but that has been on a noted downtrend lately, and I don't think that's been a very good thing. Similarly, I think Protestantism is to blame for a lot of nutty justification for the rich and powerful getting away with stuff like this, but I'm going to be vague about what I mean by that because it would be an essay length post.
wesapien | 9 hours ago
miki123211 | 9 hours ago
The US government initiating action against Nvidia for breaking the law, causing the affair to come to light? Yeah, that'd be fine by me. Somebody inside that government tattling tales to the NY Times, possibly with tacit consent of their superiors? That I have concerns with.
I've seen a theory floated online that somebody inside the government, who was part of the faction advocating for stricter sanctions on China, leaked this in a way to cause maximum damage to the anti-restrictions faction. Whether Huang (female Huang) was actually a Chinese spy in the first place is also up in the air, keep in mind that while the affair has almost certainly occurred, given that Huang (male) has admitted to it himself, the Chinese spy allegations are still unverified. It could possibly have been a "grain of truth in a sea of lies" play.
quantified | 6 hours ago
Everything only comes to light with the New York Times reporting on it. It would be fine if the government did it, but... they didn't.
If nothing else, this indicated to the board that JH is capable of thinking with his dick and that can be a problem for business.
anon291 | 8 hours ago
> if you create enough value, you get to ignore things like "rules", "laws" and "common sense".
Hmm... I wonder why that is. Could it be because a bunch of CEOs, prominent politicians, and business people were found to have taken multiple trips to an island where the had sex with children and nothing happened to them? No, it couldn't possibly be that. I'm sick of the pearl clutching against a man who had consensual relationships with adult women his own age, while we excuse pedophilia.
lenerdenator | 8 hours ago
Do we have evidence that his legally-recognized other half consented to these relationships? If so, fine. That still doesn't remove the problems with those relationships, like the possibility of Alice Huang being a PRC intelligence asset, or the fact that one of the affairs was with a company employee, which can, in a roundabout way, place potential penalties on her career if she doesn't consent.
>while we excuse pedophilia.
Excuse me, where the f*ck did I excuse pedophilia???
butlike | 5 hours ago
lenerdenator | 4 hours ago
https://khanna.house.gov/media/press-releases/khanna-massie-...
anon291 | 4 hours ago
In this day and age of no-fault divorce, co-parenting, etc, where is this moral outrage coming from for a man cheating on his wife / girlfriend? I'm just so confused TBH. 'Legally-recognized other half'.... in no jurisdiction is it illegal to cheat on your wife.
> like the possibility of Alice Huang being a PRC intelligence asset,
The sole evidence that she is a Chinese intelligence asset is that she is Chinese.
> he fact that one of the affairs was with a company employee, which can, in a roundabout way, place potential penalties on her career if she doesn't consent.
Forgive me for not feeling sorry for a likely deca, probably centi, millionaire. This is not some secretary intern.
> Excuse me, where the f*ck did I excuse pedophilia???
Because, if we're going to be witchhunting CEOs for their personal lives, there are a helluva lot worse people than Huang that need to go.
lenerdenator | 3 hours ago
If Huang had just slept with someone other than his wife, it wouldn't be a story. The outrage here isn't from the fire-and-brimstone perspective. I'm a single guy in my mid-30s; even here in Middle America there are plenty of people who practice ENM, no-fault divorce, and coparenting. It's now widely recognized that people aren't necessarily monogamous as soon as they get married.
At the same time, it's still an expectation that one should not do that sort of activity behind a spouse's back. It could result in other issues that could cause them issues, like STIs, or planning life around a child they didn't expect, or estate planning complications. Being open with your partner in life about the feelings you have on the matter is important, and puts the "ethical" in "ethical non-monogamy".
We don't know what the Huangs' arrangement was. I hope it was understood between them, and that all of that was sorted. If not, well, Jensen's going to get to deal with the fallout with that. Which brings us to the problems with the relationships themselves.
> The sole evidence that she is a Chinese intelligence asset is that she is Chinese.
Let's be honest here: that's not enough to get a story going in 2026. There's the fact that she set up a company in Singapore that had revenue figures that far outpaced what's expected for a company of its age, and the fact that they may have helped Chinese interests dodge US export restrictions on Nvidia's products. This was important enough that it was known to Nvidia corporate and the US government. You don't get attention like that just by dating someone from China.
> Forgive me for not feeling sorry for a likely deca, probably centi, millionaire. This is not some secretary intern.
Cultures like this impact everyone. Do we know if the executive was promoted or otherwise benefitted because of her relationship with Jensen? No, but it immediately opens up a conflict of interest for any request she has of the c-suite.
At worst, Huang was operating a Weinstein-like casting couch for roles within the company. If you can make an executive have to perform those sorts of actions in order to advance in her career, what does the secretary intern have to put up with?
> Because, if we're going to be witchhunting CEOs for their personal lives,
This isn't a witchhunt for the reasons stated above. It's SV, bud. People do all sorts of non-traditional relationship arrangements. Hell, even the Alice Huang affair was probably passable once the next news cycle hit. When he's sleeping with people who report to him, it's a problem on its face. It's unprofessional and it makes everyone at the company wonder just what they'll have to do to get ahead.
> there are a helluva lot worse people than Huang that need to go.
We can actually take care of both groups of people. That is actually possible, believe it or not.
anon291 | 30 minutes ago
mlcrypto | 9 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | 7 hours ago
netrap | 9 hours ago
hypfer | 9 hours ago
It is true for anything with a board, of course. But there is no rule mandating boards.
bpicolo | 9 hours ago
hypfer | 9 hours ago
> If you publicly humiliate your family and the business, you're out
There is no "* only applies to publicly traded companies". Hence, it is incorrect.
The bigger point I am trying to make here being that not everything is investor-driven. People can run businesses without that. It annoys me greatly that HN regularly forgets that.
swiftcoder | 9 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
miki123211 | 9 hours ago
In theory, Nvidia shareholders, if dissatisfied with today's decision, could vote to oust the current board and replace it with people more sympathetic to Huang, who would, as their first decision, re-hire him as CEO, as would be their prerogative. This is... unlikely to happen.
None of the above is investment advice.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
antonvs | 9 hours ago
tyingq | 9 hours ago
There are many examples where the outed affair resulted in nothing material when neither of the above was true.
This case, seems to touch both.
foobarian | 8 hours ago
johnnyApplePRNG | 9 hours ago
Marriages of 41+ years can get into any kind of dynamic.
noboostforyou | 9 hours ago
His open letter about his infidelity seems to imply he has embarrassed his wife and family, have you read it?
simoncion | 9 hours ago
He has also said so very many times in so very many ways that Nvidia was absolutely not involved in violation of export control laws regarding the export of its products to China. That -in fact- there was absolutely no smuggling going on and claims to the contrary were utterly baseless and without merit.
I agree with ohnnyApplePRNG's assertion that we know literally nothing about the private life and situation of Mr. Huang and his family.
noboostforyou | 9 hours ago
> we know literally nothing
He "literally" wrote about how his actions hurt his family, I'm not sure why there's a second account parroting the exact same phrase.
simoncion | 4 hours ago
He repeatedly and aggressively lied about violating export restrictions. "Our chips aren't potato chips. These GPUs weigh two tons. [So, how would you smuggle those? It'd be impossible!]" is an especially memorable deflection of his. He's obviously very willing to lie about very serious things when doing so is beneficial.
> He "literally" wrote about how his actions hurt his family...
He also spoke and wrote about how it was impossible to smuggle Nvidia hardware into China, and that everyone who was claiming that smuggling was going on were liars. CEOs will often lie when issuing Obligatory Standard Statements, whether they be brusque dismissals of accusations of the company's wrongdoing, or assertions of how shameful they consider their behavior that lead them to do whatever it was that they've been caught doing. CEOs make the expected public statement and get on with their lives.
Plus, given how most folks are -at best- confused by and -at worst- enraged by things like polyamory, why on earth would he publicly reveal it if his family was actually totally okay with regular extramarital sex and romance?
No, situations like this get the Standard Admission of Deep Shame and Regret For All The Harm Caused, regardless of whether or not what's said has any resemblance to what the family feels about the situation. The only folks who know how the members of the family feel about this are folks who actually know the family.
esseph | 9 hours ago
Uh... but we do!
---
I owe my family and all of you an apology.
I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry.
Throughout my life, my family has given me love and support. They deserve my honesty and loyalty. Instead, I let them down and damaged the life we built together. I take full responsibility for what I did and the hurt I caused, and I accept the criticism that comes with it.
To my wife and family: I love you. I know an apology cannot undo what I have done. I hope our family will heal and that, over time, I can earn back your trust.
To my colleagues at NVIDIA, including those I have worked alongside for decades, and to our board, partners, and shareholders around the world: you deserve better from me. Leading NVIDIA is the privilege of my life. My responsibility is to serve you and be worthy of your trust. I have fallen short of that responsibility. I am fully committed to NVIDIA and will work to earn back your confidence.
Regarding the national security concerns raised in news reports, NVIDIA’s Board of Directors has initiated an independent investigation. I support the investigation and will cooperate fully. I love our country and our company. I am committed to protecting NVIDIA and supporting America’s national security. I am proud and grateful to be an American.
My family bears no responsibility for my choices. I do. Please give them privacy.
Jensen
---
Source: https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/a-message-to-our-company
pbhjpbhj | 9 hours ago
Don't get me wrong, I'm very much a promoter of monogamy.
I think it is naive to assume that such public statements are the whole truth of a matter.
People who fuck up a company (or have an affair, or get caught snorting drugs off a sex-worker) aren't really 'stepping back to spend more time with their families'. Historically the classic example of executive public statements.
dannyw | 8 hours ago
ImPostingOnHN | 8 hours ago
If you have stronger evidence that the statement was untruthful when it said he hurt his family, you may present it.
Until such time, the statement strengthens the bayesian prior, which is that his affairs hurt his family, and thus that is what we can conclude. We need not be 100% confident to conclude this absent further evidence. >50% confidence suffices.
itishappy | 7 hours ago
Yes, and it would have helped. CEOs have "exciting" relationships all the time, and folks seem entirely willing to accept this.
These are entirely different stories:
"My wife and I have a non-traditional relationship and would prefer to keep the specifics private, but no harm was caused by my actions."
"I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry."
selimthegrim | 6 hours ago
Yeri | 9 hours ago
It's clearly the CN link and/or the cosying up with a customer that is the problem; the board would not care about his private life (and neither should the public, tbh).
And the open letter sounds more like it was written the way the public would expect a CEO to write.
estearum | 9 hours ago
wildzzz | 6 hours ago
estearum | 9 hours ago
cm2012 | 8 hours ago
bigstrat2003 | 7 hours ago
landl0rd | 9 hours ago
gwbas1c | 9 hours ago
That's a very narrow view that's a function of one's religion, culture, and values.
When I was in school, (US) my very Catholic French teacher explained that his uncle, in France, had a mistress. His uncle's wife knew and was okay with it. What my teacher was explaining is that the culture around marriage varies considerably through the world, and you can't take for granted that what we were taught (monogamy) is the standard that others live to, or even expect from you.
landl0rd | 8 hours ago
cunnymcface | 8 hours ago
landl0rd | 8 hours ago
cunnymcface | 8 hours ago
Perhaps it’s you that is out of touch?
Both partners in this case know and/or participate, you don’t want drama at your games night after all. There is no wrong here, it turns out that many partners like seeing their partner have a great time.
gwbas1c | 8 hours ago
Please don't make the mistake of assuming that American culture is homogeneous: It's not.
landl0rd | 8 hours ago
gwbas1c | 5 hours ago
No, there isn't.
There is a significant part of American culture that separates personal life from professional life. IE, an affair is treated as a private matter to be handled by the married (or committed) couple. (IE, this is why many people in this thread focus on Huang's job performance over the affair.)
And I agree with the latter: The affair is a matter between Huang and his wife; it's a signal of his trustworthiness and honesty, and raises concerns about national security. But beyond that, it's not my place, or your place, to judge.
gwbas1c | 22 minutes ago
He is an immigrant, he holds dual citizenship in Taiwan, and regularly travels there.
I didn't go so far as to find out if he married in the US or elsewhere, or if his wedding was Christian.
What I do now is that in some cultures in that part of the world, it is acceptable for a man to visit a prostitute during a business trip. It's not something I condone.
I should also point out that in the US, there's no standard wedding vows! I don't think you know what vows Huang made with his wife; nor do I think you know what their expectations were in their relationship.
qwytw | 9 hours ago
landl0rd | 9 hours ago
qwytw | 8 hours ago
Well we don't know that, you are not legally required to love someone you are married to and I have no clue what their relationship is like or whether they have any sort of "arrangements". I could hardly care less really since its their private matter.
> just what might he do to you, the customer or shareholder?
I don't really see a correlation between those things. All sorts of immoral degenerates (e.g. Musk, (potentially) Gates and I assume plenty of other lesser known CEOs) have generated massive amounts of value for their shareholders.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
martiverse | 8 hours ago
otterley | 8 hours ago
That’s not quite true. A more accurate statement would be: A marriage may be annulled in some U.S. states if one spouse entered the marriage with a concealed, permanent intention not to consummate it, and that intention constitutes fraud going to the essence of the marriage.
If the couple was having sex after marriage, and then one partner decided to cease having it some time later, that is generally not grounds for annulment.
If it were permitted, this would make many, if not most, late-stage marriages subject to annulment. People get sick and injured or just incapable in old age.
neom | 9 hours ago
estearum | 9 hours ago
Look at the NVDA stock chart. There you go! That's why affairs are relevant to business! Business is always about trust, and someone who isn't deserving of their own spouse's trust certainly isn't deserving of anyone else's.
darkwater | 9 hours ago
Why? I'm playing a bit devil's advocate here, but why? Because society think it's bad and a leader should be associated with positive views? Because if they got caught they are not smart enough to be the leader?
Why just this specific thing is to be considered? Why, for example, all the Musk's "extravagances" are not ground for a CEO termination? I'm pretty sure many other CEOs have many of those "extravagances" and manage to keep their position but yet, if you have an affair, you're 100% toasted.
Maybe I don't understand enough the US culture.
halfmatthalfcat | 9 hours ago
kome | 8 hours ago
throw310822 | 8 hours ago
estearum | 8 hours ago
balarjin | 7 hours ago
In 2016, the choice was between Trump and Clinton. Clinton famously excused her husband's infidelity by calling the long list of women who claimed they were assaulted as "a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty".
In 2024, the choice was between Trump and Harris. Harris got into politics by being the mistress of a CA governor.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if the US presidential election offered a choice between someone who was moral and someone who was as immoral as our existing political class. But that has not happened in my lifetime, and I don't expect that to change.
selimthegrim | 6 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
kome | 7 hours ago
robhlt | 8 hours ago
estearum | 9 hours ago
But anyway a person's character is not cleanly separable between personal and professional life, so yeah affairs add (many) points to the "not to be trusted" column.
> Business is always about trust, and someone who isn't deserving of their own spouse's trust certainly isn't deserving of anyone else's.
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 9 hours ago
This has less to do with the relative social morality of his behavior, and rather that he has more control over the boards of his companies, and his personality represents a larger percentage of the perceived values of his companies.
Meaning that the desire and leverage for shareholders or the board to actually punish him is significantly less. Shareholders would potentially be evaporating trillions in speculative market value that is not backed up by Tesla or SpaceX's actual business fundamentals.
And any shareholders who disagree with his behavior have had plenty of time to leave and take their earnings by now, which means that the remaining shareholders are a self-selecting set who is okay with his behavior as long as it keeps making them money.
zdragnar | 8 hours ago
In this case, Huang hit all three. Changing CEOs is also a good way to get the media coverage over faster, or at least change the narrative in the pubic (and investors) minds.
If it were just an affair, I doubt he would have lost his job. It wasn't, though, and the other circumstances- potentially dodging export controls and abusing a role of power over a subordinate- came with far too much heat, so to speak.
Also, affairs make for much more entertaining gossip than the other items, so it's probably natural that that aspect gets talked about more.
neom | 8 hours ago
*Everything on a spectrum.
bluGill | 8 hours ago
It is a conflict of interest same as any other. If there is no conflict of interest then the company won't care. As the CEO of the company every other employee works for him and in turn he has power over them.
Society will not like you (in the US), but nothing more will happen.
inanutshellus | 9 hours ago
Markets care about predictability.
To that end, it's the secret and the reveal of that secret that's the issue for a leader. If a CEO is open about his socially-unacceptable behavior from the beginning, there's no shock to absorb.
estearum | 9 hours ago
vasac | 9 hours ago
estearum | 9 hours ago
vasac | 8 hours ago
estearum | 7 hours ago
I'm jealous!
vasac | 7 hours ago
estearum | 7 hours ago
Seems like a real analytical breakthrough that I'd legitimately love to learn more about.
_ph_ | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
jeffrallen | 2 hours ago
OvervCW | 8 hours ago
GolfPopper | 7 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
prewett | 2 hours ago
kube-system | 4 hours ago
threetonesun | 9 hours ago
jeffrallen | 2 hours ago
Dumb is apparently totally normal at that level.
kome | 8 hours ago
crazygringo | 8 hours ago
Humans don't have some kind of overall "morality" or "judgment" setting that applies equally to all areas of life, where a failing in one area translates to failings in other areas.
You can be an amazing CEO and a terrible father. You can have the best judgment in the world around mothering, and abysmal judgment in business. Most importantly, you can be totally trustworthy in the realm of business, yet not in romance.
The idea that there is this binary switch, where someone is either perfectly trustworthy in all contexts, or else you can no longer trust them in any context, is just not an accurate understanding of how real human beings work. It's not supported by modern psychology.
kome | 8 hours ago
bluGill | 8 hours ago
My company is willing to hire my wife, but she wouldn't be allowed to work for me, nor I her.
qsi | 8 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 7 hours ago
AnimalMuppet | 7 hours ago
mrkstu | 8 hours ago
MadnessASAP | 8 hours ago
At the end of the day Jensen chose to have an affair with a senior officer of a company strongly suspected of bypassing trade restrictions and should have known that it would be a terrible look for Nvidia and himself. Even if he didn't suspect her of being an agent of China, even if he didn't believe the allegations against Mega speed, even if he had no intentions of passing confidential information or aiding in bypassing trade restrictions. He knew it would carry the appearance of all those things.
That is the unforgivable lapse in judgement.
dingaling | 7 hours ago
If you can't adhere to the terms of a voluntarily-entered personal contract with a person to whom you've promised utter faithfulness, why should I believe you'll be trustworthy with regard to some boring, impersonal business contracts?
cossray | 6 hours ago
madaxe_again | 8 hours ago
sensanaty | 7 hours ago
- Signed, another European
kome | 7 hours ago
Starman_Jones | 4 hours ago
bronson | 2 hours ago
Really?
ludicrousdispla | 5 hours ago
spbaar | 3 hours ago
siva7 | 9 hours ago
miohtama | 9 hours ago
godshatter | 7 hours ago
mapcars | 9 hours ago
aaronharnly | 9 hours ago
wolfinterval | 8 hours ago
In a Goffman Front Stage/Back Stage sense, you are supposed to keep the front stage presentation on the level of a pious monk or nun.
The irony to me is this just another asymmetrical advantage for Chinese culture.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
ks2048 | 7 hours ago
wildzzz | 6 hours ago
There's a reason why government background checks looks at financial records. Someone that has trouble paying their bills due to a gambling habit might be easy to turn by the enemy with some cash. Or someone that regularly cheats on their wife might be willing to do some favors for a pretty girl if she lets him sleep with her.
butlike | 6 hours ago
"Haha you mean the Chinese spy guy? Hey ask if you can get a discount if your secretary sleeps with their CEO haha"
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
JeremyNT | 9 hours ago
"It's not the crime, it's the coverup."
chabska | 9 hours ago
Also, an affair is only blackmail material in a society of prudes. I recall the story about a president who was confronted with condemning photos of his activities by CIA agents, and he pretty much encouraged the agents to publish the photos.
sarchertech | 8 hours ago
You don’t have to be a prude to think cheating on a spouse is condemnable.
In general, it also doesn’t really matter what society thinks. You can just threaten to reveal the affair to the spouse. And even in the case the spouse doesn’t really care it’s fodder they can potentially use in a divorce to get a better deal.
One thing worth pointing out is that in this case in addition to the affair with the Chinese spy he was allegedly having an affair with a subordinate, which is always problematic.
otterley | 8 hours ago
For better or worse, this is the world we live in.
I-M-S | 8 hours ago
k1ko | 7 hours ago
red-iron-pine | 8 hours ago
Sukarno. "Project Happy Days", lol.
He (Sukarno) thought it was hilarious and sent copies to his friends.
CIA was pissed w/ him because he killed a lot of Communists but then started leaning to China and beefing with Malaysia, which irritated the British
victorhooi | 7 hours ago
Although if you read his Wikipedia page, he had many, many wives, some concurrently, and the youngest was 19...so it's probably true, lol.
Then you read about a certain EV company CEO and his escapades and repopulating the planet, and you don't know what to think.
Or Charlie Sheen...
I guess politicians, celebrities and CEOs are another world from us mere mortals.....
afavour | 8 hours ago
No? All it requires is for Jensen to want to remain with his wife and for his wife to be willing to divorce him if she finds out he has an affair.
Or, even if we suppose he doesn’t care about his wife’s feelings at all, he might be very incentivised by losing half of his assets in a divorce. It’s worth many, many millions to him.
Very little involvement from society in that one.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
red-iron-pine | 9 hours ago
he was fucking a spy
he was fucking one of his direct reports
what are two things you shouldn't ever do as a CEO of the biggest company in the world?
this wasn't Cindy the random waitress from the Palo Alto Ruth Chris', these were literally two people he should never be fucking
he put the company at risk of national security issues and HR lawsuits for what is otherwise painfully mid-tier pussy. he's gotta go.
orliesaurus | 8 hours ago
cm2012 | 8 hours ago
orliesaurus | 6 hours ago
cm2012 | 5 hours ago
https://abcnews.com/Technology/wireStory/china-dismisses-spy...
orliesaurus | 5 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
cm2012 | 8 hours ago
noboostforyou | 8 hours ago
This is an extremely unnecessary misogynistic comment.
hatethehate | 4 hours ago
kccqzy | 7 hours ago
It’s unambiguously a good thing that the next NVIDIA CEO (even if just an interim CEO) is a woman, and that the AMD CEO is a woman.
chaorace | 9 hours ago
This is how things change. Slowly and then all at once. If the board were more in love with him, they'd probably have been willing to turn a blind eye for just a little while longer. No such luck for Jensen, but we make our own luck in these things.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
throw310822 | 9 hours ago
I can hardly imagine anything more stupid than judging the aptitude of the CEO of a 5T$ business based on his private love life.
II2II | 9 hours ago
bluGill | 8 hours ago
You should be concerned about corporate crime.
That doesn't change that there is a conflict of interest here and any company should fire someone who has a conflict of interest that they are not carefully managing to ensure they don't become real.
bluGill | 8 hours ago
jackbravo | 8 hours ago
rhipitr | 8 hours ago
alkonaut | 6 hours ago
carlosjobim | 3 hours ago
reaperducer | 8 hours ago
It's not entirely about humiliation.
Having an affair (or multiple, in this case) demonstrates poor decision making. You don't want someone who can't make wise choices running your company.
notenchange | 9 hours ago
Having these people saying otherwise is pure hypocrisy.
shimman | 9 hours ago
_verandaguy | 9 hours ago
ImPostingOnHN | 6 hours ago
no regulation?
regulation without representation?
_verandaguy | 6 hours ago
If you've had a career in congress, parliament, whatever, you can live comfortably off of the various media appearances you're likely to have for much of the rest of your life.
Representatives in government should be able to keep it in their pants when it comes to investments at least while they're in government, and have a thick, thick wall between their jobs running a country (or state, or whatever) and the management of their investments. Blind trusts should be the bare minimum.
What I'd prefer to see is that while actively sitting in government, representatives must keep their savings invested in funds so diversified into low-risk instruments that almost no regulation can benefit them significantly more than it would an average passive investor.
notenchange | 9 hours ago
ImPostingOnHN | 4 hours ago
However it is looking like his fellow philanderer donald knew and kept it under wraps for personal gain.
0 – https://www.quiverquant.com/congresstrading/politician/Nancy...
notenchange | 3 hours ago
She is up 934% since 2014. This congresswoman is the greatest financial genius in the all history of mankind. She was beating S&P steadily, every year and since 2014 she is up more than 600% compared to the S&P.
For context, the probable next best investor - after all these great financial minds in congress - is Warren Buffet, and he is actually down 34.8% compared to the S&P since 2014.
You will only know that Nancy Pelosi was up to since the beginning of October next January. Congress members only have to submit their trades (their SEC fillings) every 3 months. [1]
[1] https://www.online-tech-tips.com/track-congressional-stock-t...
ImPostingOnHN | 2 hours ago
It doesn't, however, show sales of nvidia stock prior to this release. Thus no such sales happened, unless you have any further evidence.
It is, however, looking like JH's fellow philanderer donald knew, and kept it under wraps for personal gain. Probably insider trading. I mean, just look at how much donald and his family's wealth has increased compared to the S&P500, or Warren Buffett.
notenchange | 2 hours ago
Congress members are not mandated to fill a trade as it happens. If Nancy Pelosi latest filling day was Nov 6 (as you are pointing out), it means that she is only forced to show trades up to 30 days before (and that is mostly what she does as her median filling delay is of 24 days).
Also, as you are so keen to bring Trump into the discussion for some reason. I must sadly tell you that the chap is only 4.4% up compared to S&P during all his history as a member of the government/representative. The guy is not nearly the same financial genius as Nacy Pelosy.
ImPostingOnHN | 2 hours ago
So now, the onus is on you to convincingly back up the allegations you're making regarding sales of nvidia stock, and you haven't. If you have some sort of evidence that Nancy made the trade alleged, and is delaying reporting, whether allowed or not, please share it.
The evidence is, however, looking like JH's fellow philanderer donald knew, and kept it under wraps, probably insider trading for personal gain.
notenchange | an hour ago
ImPostingOnHN | an hour ago
The allegation is that she sold nvidia stock right before this happened. Is there any evidence for this?
cowlevel | an hour ago
boringg | 9 hours ago
Congeec | 8 hours ago
Topfi | 9 hours ago
Very much dislike that this in large part is overshadowed by his adultery, which should be considered separate and treated totally private, at least for the sake of his family.
aaa_aaa | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
verramilli | 9 hours ago
ericmay | 9 hours ago
If the Chinese Communist Party are going through such great lengths to obtain these advanced Nvidia chips, it further invalidates a lot of what I've been reading here and elsewhere about China "catching up" or that being the leading models isn't what matters (commoditization). You don't do stuff like this unless you really need something.
ricardobeat | 9 hours ago
Not selling them chips virtually guarantees that they will learn how to make their own, very quickly. The end result of that is much, much worse for the USA.
(and could leave Taiwan in a much weaker position in the near future)
thenthenthen | 9 hours ago
ericmay | 9 hours ago
Where is the evidence that China is catching up considered a fiat d accompli?
Do you presume that China is destined to always at least catch up in every sector or field ever? That stinks of Chinese Exceptionalism to me.
If they could just "catch up" they would, and whether we sell them chips wouldn't matter because they would want to create their own Nvidia and export chips and make money too.
dudefeliciano | 8 hours ago
The ever closing gap between the capabilities of frontier models vs chinese open weight models.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
ImPostingOnHN | 8 hours ago
Kbelicius | 8 hours ago
earthdeity | 8 hours ago
That's not a strategy that leads to actually being the best.
chucklenorris | 7 hours ago
stackghost | 8 hours ago
The phrase is “fait accompli”, without a D, and is French for “accomplished feat”.
balarjin | 7 hours ago
Suppose you want to build something that requires technical knowledge (a GPU, a fighter jet, ...). You have engineers, but they don't yet know how to build it.
If no one on earth has ever built this thing, you need to consider the possibility that it can't be done at a cost you can pay. Perhaps it violates some law of physics, or it can't be manufactured without knowing some chemistry/physics that we are 100+ years from discovering.
If a company in some other country is already building this thing, you can be sure it is possible to build it. That is a critical piece of information! It means you don't need to discover (much) new physics. It means you can buy/steal a working copy and look at it to learn about it. It means there are engineers you can hire/spy on to understand their design process. It means you can more easily convince a bank/government to fund development, as they have proof your goals are achievable.
Inventing a thing is much harder than inventing a clone of a thing. The idea that China doesn't have the people and organization to copy things other countries make is the opposite of Chinese Exceptionalism. It is the belief that the Chinese are uniquely incapable of engineering work. This is obviously not true.
ericmay | 5 hours ago
Which broadly leads to two conclusions:
They can't do it. If they could they would. If you could invest and create your own Nvidia, ASML, TSMC, &c. you would do that especially if you are China due to its stated goals and actions it takes that we can all see toward those goals.
They can do it and so selling them the chips doesn't matter other than helping to speed up their ability to do it, so we don't want to sell them the chips and thus speed up their capabilities.
But your viewpoint also holds true for the United States and Europe. Anything China can do we can also do, otherwise you're just supposing Chinese Exceptionalism.
teeray | 8 hours ago
StableAlkyne | 8 hours ago
If the US or China developes an AGI that can leverage RSI, the game is over. It is over in the same way that WW3 is over as soon as the missiles are in the air: it doesn't matter who has the fastest or highest yield missiles, because there is a finite amount of time before there is nobody left to care about the advantages of one side. Except at least WW3 is over in about an hour, whereas an AGI could take years or decades to complete whatever thing it has been misaligned to desire.
AI alignment research is still in its alchemy era, and global cyber security is underfunded and bad. As a species, we simply do not have the tools to deal with AGI that can self-improve.
faidit | 8 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 7 hours ago
Fricken | 5 hours ago
Spooky23 | 8 hours ago
NVIDIA’s commercial interest is pretty clear… it’s beneficial to them. to sell everyone to maintain the dominance of CUDA. That is not necessarily the national interest. And remember that espionage and infiltration is not a one-sided affair, the US may well have the ability to sabotage Chinese development efforts. You just don’t know.
End of the day, corporate CEOs are very powerful, but they’re not as powerful as the government. My guess is that Jenson truly didn’t think that this individual was a spy, and figured that the questionable legality of chip exports to Chinese proxies could be addressed by ingratiating the administration.
techpression | 8 hours ago
dboreham | 8 hours ago
delta_p_delta_x | 8 hours ago
No, they haven't. They spent the first decade after WW2 repairing the damage left behind by the Japanese and their Civil War. Subsequently they managed to starve tens of millions afterwards in several missteps, and then righted themselves.
They then spent three to four decades lifting about thrice the US population out of extreme abject poverty, and then in the last 20 years catching up. And catch up they have; they are already the leaders in green technology and EVs, already manufacture some of their own chips, already have indigenous military aerospace capability, which they are now expanding to civilian use. They make almost everything in the average household.
not_a_bot_4sho | 8 hours ago
Are you proposing we guarantee access to avoid potential access?
somenameforme | 8 hours ago
umbra07 | 5 hours ago
hattmall | 7 hours ago
wildzzz | 6 hours ago
China is a trading partner but there is still a serious catalyst for war in the form of the South China Sea. If we went to war with China in 5 years time, why would we sell them the tech they need to match our ability now? Let them figure it out on their own.
dr_kiszonka | 4 hours ago
jazzyjackson | 7 hours ago
An economy kept dependent on American tech is unlikely to drop bombs on America and vice versa. Co dependency prevents war.
chasd00 | 7 hours ago
Avicebron | 6 hours ago
Danox | 5 hours ago
Soon, China, if they aren’t already, will be the premier developer of Thorium reactors courtesy of Oak Ridge, Tennessee and they also are now number one or at the least 1A when it comes to high-speed rail, and if the Russians and the Ukrainians weren’t fighting each other, that high-speed rail probably would be already built out all the way to eastern Europe.
Danox | 5 hours ago
somenameforme | 8 hours ago
For another example, the reason Chinese are not allowed on the 'international' ISS is because of the Wolf Amendment. [1] The idea was that if we just allowed them onto the ISS they'd steal all of our elite tech or something. Within a decade they had launched their own space station and carried out various revolutionary space activities.
And of course all of that happened while the ISS itself continues to deteriorate with no replacement in sight. And when China did an unprecedented sample return mission from the far side of the Moon and offered the whole world access to samples, US researchers had to jump through a bunch of hoops to receive them, again thanks to the same law.
It's just myopia.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_Amendment
FuriouslyAdrift | 6 hours ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davidson_window
zoeysmithe | 9 hours ago
Same when you sanction food imports. The elites who make decisions will always be fed. Sanctions are almost always an attack on the working class who do not make the high-level political decisions the sanctions are trying to address. Not to mention the idea of "making life hard on them so they revolt" almost never works.
Sanctions should be a bigger conversation. They are almost never needed and especially trade tariffs and such are always used for the most corrupt cronyism.
jurgenburgen | 7 hours ago
There’s also the minor quibble that restricting food exports to starve another country are illegal under international law.
bigfudge | 7 hours ago
That sanctions only harm the civilian economy is not an argument against them. Kinetic sanctions agains oil refining are also primarily impacting the general population and the military have enough oil. But they still impact the ability of the Russians to fund the war. Civilian infrastructure and economic assets are used by militaries too.
sugarkjube | 8 hours ago
China catching up does not mean they are not still behind.
Also, China is a big country with many companies. While some may be trying to catch up via local development, others may still prefer getting western hardware right now e.g. in order to get a competitive advantage over those catching up.
Danox | 5 hours ago
johnbellone | 8 hours ago
kraftman | 8 hours ago
ericmay | 8 hours ago
But here's a link to the podcast episode if you want to give it a listen. It will inform a lot to the discussion taking place here and help you understand a few of the things he said that are probably now wrong: https://www.dwarkesh.com/p/jensen-huang
midas89 | 8 hours ago
If they don't need NVIDIA then why is the now former CEO of NVIDIA trying so hard to allow exprt controls to be relaxed.
And it's because brute forcing only allows you to not fall behind, but you can't catch up to frontier models or surpass.
kraftman | 7 hours ago
arw0n | 7 hours ago
Let's assume for a second that the compromat story on Huang is true, how much would that have cost? It could be everywhere from 10k to 10m $, depending on how difficult it was to get access, but it would still be a rounding error for AI invest.
Chips aren't what maketh SI anyway. The US is ahead because of a trifecta of having the best (most) hardware, best data, and best talent. You might also throw in business culture. But the same way Google is leading from behind in the US AI eco system, China is behind the frontier on LLMs, but laying foundational work in robotics, multi-modal models and integrated factories that might prove a big advantage down the line.
Danox | 5 hours ago
gampleman | 8 hours ago
cyanydeez | 7 hours ago
Danox | 5 hours ago
mrandish | 7 hours ago
WSJ reports that U.S. intelligence says Chinese intelligence approached Alice to become an asset after she met Jensen in March 2024. So, she was an opportunistic info source, not targeted in advance.
backhold | 6 hours ago
Unbeknownst to them, the Russian was actually at that time trying to make contact with western intelligence, as he was keen to defect! He was just a bit too awkward to respond to flirting.
He did eventually manage to defect to Britain, and died in 2025. His name was Oleg Gordievsky.
ericd | 8 hours ago
That said, I don't have any special insight into the specifics of who was driving the demand backing Megaspeed.
chasd00 | 7 hours ago
ericd | 7 hours ago
creaturemachine | 5 hours ago
kevin_thibedeau | 5 hours ago
markhahn | 6 hours ago
Danox | 5 hours ago
One other little crack in the dike. Was Sam Altman saying regular computer users shouldn’t have memory all memory should be allocated to data centers.
What will be the third crack in the dike?
Betelbuddy | 9 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | 8 hours ago
Betelbuddy | 8 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | 5 hours ago
Betelbuddy | 4 hours ago
Now that I explained it in detail for you, shall we move on to addition and subtraction? Or do you need a short pause because your head is hurting you?
baobabKoodaa | an hour ago
ciupicri | 9 hours ago
DrScientist | 8 hours ago
Watched the interview and as far as I see he was getting 'heated' because he was speaking the obvious truth and being frustrated by poorly informed questions.
This is entirely expected from somebody like him who has a long history of being on the right side of technical argument.
He is a huge loss to Nvidia and the US - replaced by a ex-CFO.
falsemyrmidon | 8 hours ago
philistine | 8 hours ago
I don't see it. Nvidia has a lot to answer for, and the fact that Jensen was very successful as a CEO does not shy away from the cracks in the structure.
pj_mukh | 7 hours ago
It was illegal, and I'm sure if this comes to light there will be (major) repercussions, but I don't see it as an immoral move.
Cheating on your wife of 40 years OTOH...
scott_w | 7 hours ago
But how do we know he wasn’t being whispered to by the smoking baddie he was trying to impress? Maybe he’d not have taken the risk were he not having this affair but we know what men do when their ego is on the line. Case in point: Musk paying people to play PoE for him and losing his shit when he was caught.
Do I think money is a good enough explanation? Yes. Could I believe that what’s in his pants also played a part? Also yes.
SoftTalker | 6 hours ago
jappgar | 6 hours ago
ifyoubuildit | 6 hours ago
toast0 | 6 hours ago
If the sanctions are to prevent buying the products of slavery, that's a moral issue, and violating the sactions is also a moral issue.
Same deal if the sanctions are to prevent selling things that will be used to carry out genocide/etc. That's a moral issue, so violating the sanctions is a moral issue.
I don't think there's an alegation that the GPUs will be used for immoral purposes, just that the US government has national security concerns. Those concerns may or may not be valid, and may or may not be served by having trade sanctions applied effectively, but I don't think that's a question of morality.
It's not de facto immoral to violate the law. It could be immoral to violate the law and conceal it.
ifyoubuildit | 5 hours ago
But then it would be the thing that is sanctioned that is the immoral activity, not the breaking of a sanction, right?
It's like you said, unlawful != immoral.
toast0 | 5 hours ago
It's arguable either way, morality isn't a formal logic. There's no right answer, and it's mostly judged by popular consensus... If there is a final authority, they don't publish their notes. :p
jappgar | 4 hours ago
Unless you're saying that disloyalty and betrayal are not issues of morality.
It's very interesting to read here that Jensen is immoral for betraying his wife but not for betraying his country.
SR2Z | 5 hours ago
IMO it's not a terribly strong case to make while Boeing sells whole jetliners to China, but the law was put in place for both moral and practical reasons.
d1sxeyes | 6 hours ago
kelnos | 5 hours ago
In this case, though, I think Huang just believed these sanctions were the wrong move, and would end up long-term helping China and hurting the US. Which is fair to believe, but believing a law is counterproductive doesn't give you immunity if you break it.
adolph | 5 hours ago
This is a significant philosophical point.
https://www.econtalk.org/public-choice-and-politics-without-....jappgar | 4 hours ago
What if he "believed fidelity was the wrong move" and that he'd end up divorced eventually anyways?
When is disloyalty and dishonesty immoral?
kergonath | 3 hours ago
The relationship with his wife is neither here nor there, unless she wants to make it public. If she feels betrayed, wants a quick buck, or otherwise wants to for any reason, she will sue for divorce and, considering the publicity of the cases, she should get a favourable judgement.
It’s easy to impose our morals on others. But more than half of republicans believe that gay sex is immoral just as strongly as you believe that adultery is.
jappgar | 2 hours ago
I'm trying to point out the inconsistecy with the OP who implied sanctions evasion is not implicitly immoral but that "cheating" is.
Huang may have had an agreement with his wife that this was fine.
But he did not have an agreement with the justice department to flaunt the law and funnel GPUs to China.
pj_mukh | 2 hours ago
Neither did conscientious objectors? I don't think you mean to claim that the justice department is the final word on morality? Just that on this topic, you agree with the justice department (which is fine), but they will do things that you disagree with. They are no final arbiter and have helped enforce plenty of immoral laws in the past.
There is even a case to be made that flooding the Chinese market with advanced GPU's will hamstring China's ability to build their own, just like they have done to our ability to manufacture. In fact that is exactly the case Jensen has made plenty of times. By holding back exports you are actually creating the market conditions in China for building advanced GPU's indigenously, CCP doesn't even have to do much, the market is responding. Who's immoral and unpatriotic then?
Ydarbleoj | 6 hours ago
consensus1 | 4 hours ago
outside1234 | 7 hours ago
riddlemethat | 6 hours ago
buellerbueller | 6 hours ago
drysine | 6 hours ago
krisoft | 5 hours ago
They had an idea which they thought will be valuable. And they worked bery hard on making that idea a reality.
People complain that companies don’t have leadership with long term vision. The leadership of NVIDIA heard the idea of GGPU computation and put the resources behind the idea to make it a practical reality. Here the gap between “nerdy idea” to “product sells like hot-cakes”, is measured in decades. That is not just luck.
wnmurphy | 2 hours ago
They absolutely got incredibly lucky.
SR2Z | 5 hours ago
Jensen Huang cheated on his wife AND conspired to evade arms control regulations, but he's still a genius.
outside1234 | an hour ago
This is a $4T company for Pete's sake!
UncleOxidant | 5 hours ago
Since NVDA had such a flat corporate structure with Huang having ~60 direct reports, I expect that the company will be lost for a period of time as they try to get their bearings. This is an opportunity for AMD, INTC and others.
outside1234 | 2 hours ago
This is a $5T (well, I guess $4T now) company we are talking about. What is the board being paid for?
burnerthrow008 | 6 hours ago
buttslut5099 | 5 hours ago
jeanlou | 5 hours ago
bdelmas | 8 hours ago
skullone | 7 hours ago
smallmancontrov | 7 hours ago
m4rtink | 7 hours ago
markhahn | 6 hours ago
serf | 6 hours ago
Ma Bell without the anti-trust (yet!).
skullone | 5 hours ago
OCASMv2 | 6 hours ago
skullone | 5 hours ago
internet101010 | 7 hours ago
peezd | 7 hours ago
coffeebeqn | 6 hours ago
alcomatt | 6 hours ago
hn_throwaway_99 | 7 hours ago
Let's be clear, she is just the interim CEO (primarily because Huang neglected to ever even start a transition plan) while NVidia searches for a permanent CEO. The names I've seen floated are Rene Haas, CEO of ARM, and Ian Buck, the creator of CUDA.
gilrain | 7 hours ago
Let's expect better of leadership than to be criminal.
julianeon | 7 hours ago
dylan604 | 6 hours ago
strofocles | 7 hours ago
lern_too_spel | 7 hours ago
DrScientist | 6 hours ago
Jensen has two core points:
- stopping selling NVidia chips to China isn't going to stop China developing AI
- stopping NVidia selling to China will ultimately ceed US leadership in chips as Nvidia's commercial edge is as much about the dominant developer ecosystem as it is the chips per se.
ie the real risk is the default world tech stack shifts to open models on Chinese chips. End result Chinese lead in both.
He has spent his entire career competing and winning and he is being told he has to stop competing in order to achieve a goal that he knows won't actually be achieved by sacrificing NVidia.
In that scenario, where somebody is suggesting you throw away your life's work for nothing - I think anybody would be animated.
kgeist | 2 hours ago
As someone who isn't based in the US/EU and whose job is to deploy LLMs on premises, I can't wait for the moment when China starts selling its GPUs globally en masse with a proper CUDA equivalent. It's going to be cheaper in the long term and without all the export control drama.
bitfilped | 7 hours ago
AlphaSite | 7 hours ago
Nvidia thrived because it paired great hardware with great software.
AMD and Intel think hardware is enough; it’s not. There’s a reason neither has ever been able to compete with Nvidia.
They have a giant ego, but I’d argue it’s probably well deserved.
Apple is/was similar. They also see that hardware without great software is useless. Spend as much; if not more on software to make your hardware shine.
soulofmischief | 6 hours ago
Danox | 6 hours ago
Another thing is wrong was thinking that Apple should run in and build some type of AI model that’s proving to be well wrong the only thing in Apple’s way right now is memory. certainly isn’t money, and they certainly have the talent and house to fix the memory problem. The question is whether or not they have the will to do so.
No one equals Apple at this point in time when it comes to seamlessly integrating multiple devices in a useful way. Be it a desktop computer, laptop a smartphone, tablet, smartwatch, Apple Vision, AirPods with each iteration, once again in comparison to their competition, they seem to have the best hand at this time.
Memory cost is the biggest problem Apple has right now and it’s not like they don’t lack the money and with the Apple Silicon design group they certainly have the capability to fix it, or I should say design around it.
Yes, it might take 2 to 5 years to do it, but it’s not impossible, the main question is, do they have the will? And they’ve certainly shown it when it comes to processors, GPUs, modems, and other support chips that they can execute over time.
They may not execute on what you want or what I want, but in comparison to their competition, who is out there right now that can combine both the software and the hardware at a high level across the board?
Exoristos | 2 hours ago
So did they round something you wanted to see square, or vice versa?
vondur | 6 hours ago
Danox | 6 hours ago
nixon_why69 | 7 hours ago
You can say it was luck but it was definitely not "average".
CrimsonCape | 5 hours ago
CamperBob2 | 7 hours ago
Yeah, it pretty much does. CUDA is why they are positioned where they are. Other players like AMD and Intel could have done that, but they didn't, and if they had, they wouldn't have persevered for 10+ years with essentially nothing to show for it.
Whether CUDA will continue to maintain dominance is less clear. It may become a literal victim of its own success, as CUDA-based models gain the ability to migrate themselves to new platforms.
keybrd-intrrpt | 6 hours ago
He may not have 'invented' CUDA but he saw the potential and gave it resources to be created and continually developed.
How many "CUDA-like" ideas have be squashed at other companies by leaders that don't see the potential or are willing to take a multi-year loss?
IMO, it's like SpaceX vs other rocket companies - especially Blue Origin.
Bezos, at least at first, had just as much money if not more than Musk. So why did SpaceX do so much better than them and every other rocket company. I despise Musk personally, and he's generally not as smart as he makes himself out to be - but there is something there he does differently than others in his position, some with similar resources as he does as well.
Danox | 5 hours ago
Danox | 5 hours ago
Western companies have had that problem. when the visionary CEO bites the dust. I think the Eastern companies are even more susceptible.
Note: Nvidia is the very definition of a one trick company I think they were in trouble long-term no operating system, Microsoft is in trouble in the other direction. No real in-house hardware ability. Long-term you have to have the ability of both in-house to adjust and iterate over the long haul with the changing conditions in tech.
peezd | 6 hours ago
spunker540 | 6 hours ago
You can criticize his recent question actions all you want, but you can’t believe he is “average”.
Danox | 5 hours ago
Due to sanctions there’s one Chinese company that seems to have become a multi-dimensional company we won’t know for sure for another two years.
Being a vertical computer company appears to be coming back in style bring on the 1980s. early 1990s.
Danox | 6 hours ago
Nvidia is a highly technical company we’re gonna find out how important Jensen really was to that company tech wise?
And if you look closely at their company, what have they really innovated on over the last five or six years? from a distance, like Intel, it seems like they just turn up the juice/Wattage in short, they are just cruising along.
viklove | 5 hours ago
ryan_n | 7 hours ago
DrScientist | 5 hours ago
It clearly didn't - don't you remember the Deepseek launch where it came as a rude shock that the much vaunted concept of a compute capacity moat was blown away?
He kept repeating that while he made the best chips, computer science was more important.
ipaddr | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
ipaddr | an hour ago
skrebbel | 8 hours ago
Unless it's like super far in, if this counts as heated then I just don't know what you expect.
dominotw | 9 hours ago
Lerc | 8 hours ago
For the record I think that less than half of the people who thought the dress was black and gold were being influenced by the Chinese government to take that position.
HlessClaudesman | 8 hours ago
If the sale is not about money or share price then maybe it's ideological.
jurgenburgen | 7 hours ago
okrad | 7 hours ago
https://youtu.be/HjurAWAr_nY
MetaverseClub | 6 hours ago
rzz3 | 6 hours ago
reenorap | 6 hours ago
Money is like oxygen. If you deny oxygen/money to the Chinese chip market, they can't grow as fast. By supplying China with chips, all the money will go back to the US and not enough money will go to Chinese chip manufacturers to help them advance the way Nvidia can.
This is what Jensen was saying and he is 100% correct here. The chip ban to China will really help them catch up because the money will recirculate since they have no choice but to buy Chinese chips, and in the end it will make them much stronger.
saberience | 6 hours ago
The best way of hampering China technologically has always been about keeping them completely dependent on foreign chip supply chain, e.g. ASML, TSMC, NVDA, ARM, AVGO, INTC, etc.
If you simply ban them from getting any western chips or chip tech you simply light a viciously hot fire underneath them to develop their own TSMC equivalent and their own chip designers, and we are now seeing them catching up rapidly. In fact, they are pretty close to catching up now, basically within one or two years...
SR2Z | 5 hours ago
The best reason to NOT ban exports is that it really doesn't work against a peer state, and China is close enough now to count. Given the significant economic trouble in the PRC (youth unemployment, unwinding the property bubble, overproduction of EVs) the US could definitely have played this better instead of creating a vibrant full-stack domestic AI sector in China.
lencastre | 4 hours ago
MisterTea | 4 hours ago
nightshift1 | 4 hours ago
They hired old asml employees.
chasd00 | 4 hours ago
This has crashed, check the markets.
MostlyStable | 5 hours ago
They do not need a ban to light a fire under them. The fire is already lit and burning and nothing the west can do will even slightly dampen it.
You yourself claim they are within a couple of years. If that's the case you think they will stop developing if we sell them chips? That's laughable.
throwup238 | 5 hours ago
km144 | 5 hours ago
The fundamental contradiction of the AI maximalists like Huang is claiming that AI does not need regulated while simultaneously supporting chip exports to China. The supporting claim for the former is that we need to compete on AI with China and move as fast as possible and every day matters, while the latter implies that slowing down their compute is inconsequential.
lukan | 5 hours ago
adolph | 5 hours ago
Keeping adversaries X-behind discourages adversaries from developing a new ecosystem since X-behind is better than building new. If an adversary with tremendous resources must recreate the ecosystem, it will be adopted by US+global companies since it will be lower margin.
ycombinatrix | 5 hours ago
isthatafact | 4 hours ago
vouwfietsman | 5 hours ago
roosterIllusi0n | 5 hours ago
linkregister | 5 hours ago
If this principle were true, then autarchies like North Korea would be the most advantaged since they never have to worry about international competition in their domestic market.
Your confidence is not backed by any data or observation, it's just an unfounded inference.
JumpCrisscross | 4 hours ago
"About 600,000 of Nvidia's advanced artificial intelligence chips are stored in Hong Kong awaiting shipment to mainland China, two people familiar with the matter said, as Beijing withholds approval for large-scale imports despite demand from tech firms" [1].
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/china/nvidia-chips-pile-up-hon...
isthatafact | 4 hours ago
I do not know full details, but China did exactly that. There were articles about limiting Nvidia chip imports more than a year ago. It really highlighted the absurdity of the export ban.
To my non-expert knowledge, the reasoning behind the export ban has never been explained beyond a vague assertion that China would do some sort of evil with AI if they have bigger GPUs than some arbitrary number of transistors, and also some silliness where paying a 15% tax made some of the GPUs safe to export. It has been pretty great for Huawei.
re-thc | 4 hours ago
There are. A lot of Nvidia chips are still stuck in Hong Kong.
What the government does is not always what corporations follow.
Yokolos | 4 hours ago
https://nationaltechnology.co.uk/Nvidia_GPUs_Sitting_Unused_...
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/u-s-commerce-secr...
numpad0 | 3 hours ago
OT but one thing I didn't realize until reading this comment:
Those used CMP 170HX 8GB were advertised in front of crypto server rigs. Those were probably spread across South Asian scam malls(shopping mall buildings built in literal sovereignty contested areas of non-China/Japan/Korea/Russia non-India non-African non-Muslim Asia, under guises of Chinese tourist destinations, that are literally rented out to local Chinese-speaking gangs engaging in all sorts of gang crimes from tech support scams to human and organ trafficking, straight out of the fictitious Chiba in Neuromancer), and they would happily sell or rent compute to Chinese AI firms if only those were more valuable than 8GB VRAM they have, which they all had all along.
GPU export to China must have become significantly less meaningful since the 170HX unlock became a thing. That alone must have provided petaflops of unsanctioned untraced junks for parts priced compute to Chinese AI startups.
samuelknight | 4 hours ago
kspacewalk2 | 3 hours ago
Yeah, no. No one in Beijing will let Nvidia or the White House have that kind of power in the long run because the free market knows best and golly gee where will we get the money and whatnot. They will buy whatever they can to bridge the gap to a time when they own their own tap.
It's not a completely dissimilar argument to selling them the nukes or F-35s because "it will deny oxygen/money to the Chinese nukes and fighter jets market".
theptip | 2 hours ago
Both China’s geopolitical situation and technological history point towards them cutting any reliance on a foreign tech stack as soon as they can.
As I see it, giving them chips just means they have less of a gap to close when their own EUV fabs come online, it can’t have any delaying effect on their plans.
bijowo1676 | 5 hours ago
softwaredoug | 9 hours ago
theturtletalks | 9 hours ago
Even if this is just a coincidence, Jensen himself came out and said he donated to the ballroom, but kept the amount hidden. In internal documents, Jensen and Nvidia said to keep the amount hidden and it only came out due to disclosure documents from the government.
rob74 | 9 hours ago
theturtletalks | 9 hours ago
smallmancontrov | 8 hours ago
rob74 | 8 hours ago
pbhjpbhj | 9 hours ago
The audit on the main contractor for that "ballroom" must be wild. I guess that auditor is going to make a pretty penny.
theturtletalks | 9 hours ago
pbhjpbhj | 9 hours ago
mrkstu | 8 hours ago
KerrAvon | 8 hours ago
hax0ron3 | 5 hours ago
LeBit | 9 hours ago
Corrupt from top to bottom.
ImPostingOnHN | 6 hours ago
birds of a feather, and all that
red-iron-pine | 8 hours ago
cost of doing business. kiss the ring, get the blessing, make fat stacks -- illegally.
ihumanable | 8 hours ago
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I think that the risk is not nearly as real as it-- as they talk. And I think the risk can be managed. And it's managed, you know who? By who? The DOJ. We had a situation where somebody was reported to us to be doing something bad with AI. We called them very strongly and said, "Get ready to go to jail. Please give your wife a kiss good night."
ROSS DOUTHAT: Who was this person?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I can't tell you--
ROSS DOUTHAT: Or this company?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I can't tell you. But we said-- "Do you like the color orange because get rid --" said, "Go home right now. See your wife and children. Give 'em a kiss good night, and--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: If--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"that's the story because--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the Democrats--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"because tomorrow morning--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: --wanted--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --"you're goin' to jail."
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the-- if they--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Let me tell you--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --wanted to make a deal--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --this person--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --to put that (UNINTEL)--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --this person totally changed everything. Totally. "Yes, sir. Yes, sir--"
ROSS DOUTHAT: "Yes, sir"?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Okay--
ROSS DOUTHAT: Was it a leader of a major AI company?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One of the big ones. Yeah.
ROSS DOUTHAT: Okay.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: One of the big ones. And--
ROSS DOUTHAT: If the Democrats--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --and-- and I don't think--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --said, "We wanna put th-- we wanna--"
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --I don't--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --"codify this into law--"
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --I don't think it was--
ROSS DOUTHAT: --would you work with them--
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: --done maliciously. But it coulda been malicious, but--
---
This is what losing the Rule of Law looks like by the way. The sitting president is on TV saying that he found out someone rich and powerful is suspected of wrong doing serious enough to get a call from the president threatening him with prison, but that that's the punishment. Once that rich and powerful person bent the knee, said "Yes sir" with the right tone of voice, all was forgiven.
Equal Justice under Law means that we shouldn't punish people we don't like with harsher sentences it also means that wealth and power shouldn't be sufficient to skirt the law.
We often speak of a two-tiered justice system, but I've never seen the president go on TV and tell America in no uncertain terms, it exists, I'm a part of it, and it went very well, he said "Yes sir" just the right way and so you don't need to worry about it.
vconnor | 5 hours ago
dwoldrich | 4 hours ago
You're just NOW noticing that we have lost the rule of law?? The constitution has been continuously violated for over 100 years, we are clearly a post-constitutional republic? I guess? I think we entered full clown world in the 2000's where the currency, government and war systems started glitching out.
What I am noticing is that the high trust society we inherited has finally eroded to the point that we no longer tell ourselves that we have rules and laws that are equally (or sanely) applied.
Which is a good, scales dropping from eyes, innocence ending sort of thing. Makes me hopeful for change, in a way.
1317 | 3 hours ago
spuz | 9 hours ago
https://www.axios.com/2026/11/11/trump-lutnick-nvidia-china-...
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-administration-jail-le...
mikepurvis | 9 hours ago
rob74 | 9 hours ago
throwaw12 | 9 hours ago
As a business, why shouldn't they advocate for export to a relatively huge market? It is an expansion for them and from a business perspective completely expected.
jkukul | 9 hours ago
Dr_Birdbrain | 9 hours ago
parineum | 8 hours ago
onlyrealcuzzo | 6 hours ago
Is the problem that Nvidia was not making it as hard as it should have?
Realistically, how much does that even matter?
treefry | 6 hours ago
jappgar | 6 hours ago
Levitz | 4 hours ago
There's is no argument to be had about this specifically. You can argue whether this is true or not, but that's not relevant to this subject. If Nvidia still decides to ignore the government, it'd be not only completely, absolutely fair, to nationalize the corporation, but the country itself has a duty to its citizens to do such thing.
kphorn | 8 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 7 hours ago
stasomatic | 7 hours ago
China should have infiltrated ASML, not much they can do without them until they get the blueprints. Unlikely they aren't doing it already.
throwaw12 | 7 hours ago
these are actual weapons, does anyone use GPUs to kill humans?
AnimalMuppet | 7 hours ago
stasomatic | 7 hours ago
There is more spelunking to that situation, but that's a different thread.
serf | 5 hours ago
US congresspersons and international media outlets condemned the use of AI warfare against Iran, including the Department of Defense's (DoD) Project Maven—a target tagging system integrating elements of Palantir's Maven Smart System and Anthropic's Claude large language model.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_attack
samrus | 7 hours ago
xboxnolifes | 7 hours ago
indoordin0saur | 8 hours ago
I doubt it has anything to do with it really. China is a huge market and by not exporting to China they were missing out on tens to hundreds of billions in revenue. Any CEO would have advocated the same.
cpgxiii | 8 hours ago
Particularly in the current political moment, saying essentially "we were using high demand in a market we can't legally sell in to increase prices for American customers" is not a good look.
(Yes,obviously, not all of this is Nvidia's doing, and demand at this volume through smuggling/front companies would still affect the legitimate market. But being an active participant in it is not a good look.)
macspoofing | 8 hours ago
OK sure .. obviously sleeping with Chinese agent is a security issue .. very bad .. but Nvidia's position on the export ban was sound. The export ban does not make sense. In fact, it is counterproductive because it closes a huge market to Nvidia and makes China less reliant on US Tech - forcing them to accelerate development of homegrown GPU business.
KerrAvon | 8 hours ago
macspoofing | 7 hours ago
If Nvidia was skirting the law, then they should held accountable for that.
If Nvidia merely held a position that the particular law is, say, counter-productive and lobbied against it (but followed it) - what's illegal about that?
pixelstack | 7 hours ago
in corporate america haha
bigfudge | 7 hours ago
spiderice | 7 hours ago
ecocentrik | 5 hours ago
kube-system | 4 hours ago
pebbly_bread | 4 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 5 hours ago
Jensen had the ear of the President. He could have lobbied this properly.
Doing so by obscuring Nvidia’s Singapore business, failing to apply for an export license to Megaspeed, corruptly quashing a Commerce investigation into Megaspeed, all while sleeping with its leader who turned out to be a Chinese spy, and then only coming clean when the Congress flipped…I don’t know how he could have flipped the bird stronger at the American people.
bigyabai | 5 hours ago
I'm squarely blaming the federal admin for this. Lutnick and Rubio both knew about this way ahead of time, and their negligence is what ended up screwing the American people over. Removing Jensen doesn't prevent this corruption, it just shuffles the blame around. Huang became the fall guy for corruption at a ludicrous scale, while Donald Trump ponders installing Tim Cook (?) as his replacement.
The whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. This is the Kardashian-ization of the American tech industry.
JumpCrisscross | 4 hours ago
Everyone is. It's increasingly clear the administration helped Nvidia break the law [1].
But this is how corruption works. The mobster pays the mayor to let him break the law. That doesn't mean they aren't both breaking the law.
> t just shuffles the blame around. Huang became the fall guy for corruption at a ludicrous scale
Fall guy implies innocence and the end of the line for blame. Neither looks likely with this case. Jensen wasn't innocent. And there is is bipartisan fury starting with Lutnick.
> while Donald Trump ponders installing Tim Cook (?)
I think he got this idea from a joke Kara Swisher made. In the end, Trump would love nothing more than for a media circus around Jensen's succession to distract from the above.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/11/12/business/nvidia-megaspeed...
Levitz | 5 hours ago
Could you tell China this? Because they seem to not agree at all, given what we are seeing
kodoman | 8 hours ago
epistasis | 7 hours ago
It's not just NVIDIA that's extremely weak on China, the entire Executive branch is both weak and incompetent on what they claim is a chief concern, and Congress has been completely absent on the oversight role that it should be performing according to the US Constitution.
The incompetence and/or corruption is inexcusable. Teapot Dumb Scandal.
mcoliver | 7 hours ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2aC8lAOQbg&t=1458s
aimanbenbaha | 7 hours ago
All the regulators that kickstarted this dumb export controls in 2022, which in-turn made the american AI-stack weaker vs China, while also using doomer-fud about safety must feel glorious right now.
Sad day for developers.
iririririr | 6 hours ago
Levitz | 4 hours ago
This combines with the fact that it requires actual effort not to think China spreads propaganda regarding AI at this point, I'd rather err on the safe side.
aimanbenbaha | 51 minutes ago
mandeepj | 6 hours ago
I said the same thing a few days ago and got heavily downvoted. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50417959
> Endless congressional hearings on that topic starting in Jan. Ha! Who's going to wait until Jan? There's already a congressional hearing on Nov/18 https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/news/press-releases/chairme...
I may sound arrogant, but I am not. Many people are a bit slow to catch on to these incidents or can't see beyond one layer, like this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50418215
timmytokyo | 6 hours ago
zerohm | 5 hours ago
elictronic | 5 hours ago
saidnooneever | an hour ago
lewdwig | 6 hours ago
porphyra | 6 hours ago
How does it make sense that Jensen is compromised while advocating for exporting GPUs to China, which is something that primarily benefits NVIDIA (and arguably the US) while being against the Chinese interests? If he were compromised he would be like "well actually maybe I shouldn't export chips to China after all and give their domestic semiconductor industry a chance".
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/china/nvidia-chips-pile-up-hon...
[2] https://ng.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/nvidia-ai-ch...
[3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-09-17/china-age...
numpad0 | 6 hours ago
guerrilla | 6 hours ago
kortilla | 6 hours ago
That’s not the same as China not wanting them legitimately.
whatshisface | 5 hours ago
m_herrlich | 5 hours ago
As a public company its job is to sell as much stuff as possible to as many people as possible, they had every incentive, arguably a duty to advocate for exports to China. The incentive is there regardless of outside meddling.
Skirting the sanctions intentionally would be bad.
UncleOxidant | 5 hours ago
I don't really buy that. China was already like Nvidia's #2 or #3 market. It didn't take a Chinese agent to convince him that he wanted to sell to China.
roosterIllusi0n | 5 hours ago
bijowo1676 | 5 hours ago
but china refused to buy nvidia chips
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-08-12/china-urg...
echelon | 9 hours ago
I think it was the affair with the direct report that did him in.
That's a bigger no-no than selling to spies, especially when the administration knew about it and did nothing.
kaibee | 9 hours ago
I thought this was like, basically an open secret? Like... I'm sure they stayed within the technical letter of the law? Except if any of the laws required them to not be grossly negligent and not be cartoonishly naive. So that they can later argue that they couldn't possibly have known that chips going to South East Asia were being resold to China?
dopa42365 | 5 hours ago
shin_lao | 9 hours ago
This is obviously something that has been postponed for after the midterms.
karimf | 9 hours ago
I think NVIDIA lose more things by firing Jensen.
CyanLite2 | 9 hours ago
He put US national security at risk just because between his wife and his other mistress, he couldn't keep it in his pants.
There are some things more important than stock valuation.
Ntrails | 9 hours ago
It is far far worse than that - he lied to shareholders.
rileymat2 | 9 hours ago
qwytw | 9 hours ago
Or maybe he just simply wanted to make more money by increasing demand for Nvidia's GPUs by tacitly allowing for them to be exported to China though Singapore.
aurareturn | 9 hours ago
hardbass | 8 hours ago
subw00f | 8 hours ago
anon291 | 8 hours ago
Given that the economic growth of the USA during the last few years was entirely due to this man and his technologies, I'm going to say nah.
China having access to GPUs is not a national security threat. It's an economic threat. Not sure why people treat China as some enemy nation. It's just a competitor.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
anon291 | 4 hours ago
BeFlatXIII | 7 hours ago
MarceColl | 6 hours ago
My god, the god complex
elektronika | 5 hours ago
ActionHank | 9 hours ago
CEO is supposed to be a high integrity position despite most tech CEOs trying to pretend that is not the case. If this person cannot be loyal to those closest to him, how can he be loyal to the company or shareholders?
sharpshadow | 9 hours ago
forgotTheLast | 9 hours ago
esseph | 9 hours ago
Fricken | 9 hours ago
Matl | 9 hours ago
While Jensen seems like an egomaniac who deserves what happened to him, there's a part of me that feels some China hawks had fingers in his firing, it must not sit well with them than America's most valuable company is not in the hands of the old guard.
KingMob | 9 hours ago
Andrew_nenakhov | 8 hours ago
* — We did a test of it after similar claim a few weeks ago, and what pushed us to do a research is because my friend who works in a hotel industry was getting moderation blocks on Grok left and right — they now use only AI images to not bother with copyright trolls ever again who threaten lawsuits for things like improperly credited bought stock photo — and in their case moderation was a serious hindrance for creating images.
Matl | 7 hours ago
1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grok_sexual_deepfake_scandal
Andrew_nenakhov | 7 hours ago
Matl | 7 hours ago
Andrew_nenakhov | 4 hours ago
I'm rather confident that you would not be able to do that.
However, I'm also confident that instead of doing that you'll continue spreading information that is now obsolete and incorrect: in your original post you said that Musk has a bot, but when confronted with the current state of affairs continue to cite Wikipedia about what Musk had a year ago.
ACCount39 | 9 hours ago
Now that the possibility of him being compromised by an actual Chinese spy AND the possibility of Nvidia actually sanction-busting to ship to China regardless are on the table? Both at the same time, no less?
Yeah, that kind of liability is bonkers. Jensen might be too vital to load him into a cannon and fire him into the sun, but I'm not at all surprised that Nvidia wants him gone from the big post.
eecc | 8 hours ago
His argument was “we must not make it more convenient to develop a fully domestic stack”
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer is a fairly reasonable adage
ACCount39 | 3 hours ago
So the only thing selling to them accomplishes is give Nvidia more margins. At the cost of boosting the Chinese AI sector - possibly to the point of parity.
China at the moment has the capability to do infrastructural rollouts far faster than US or Europe, but doesn't have the chips to stuff new datacenters with. So it's easy to see why China would want the chips. But it's not like Nvidia is having trouble selling their AI accelerators outside China - and they can't ramp up accelerator production on demand. More demand for accelerators would push the prices even higher, and that would reflect in the margins, but the benefits for Nvidia weren't even that large.
So it was a questionable push all around - even before the spy scandal.
mempko | 7 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
bluepeter | 9 hours ago
michelvocks | 9 hours ago
baalimago | 9 hours ago
According to who?
duplessitous | 9 hours ago
m77 | 9 hours ago
dang | 5 hours ago
jmyeet | 9 hours ago
I believe it was the affair with the married subordinate that was the real problem. There's a huge amount of legal exposure for NVidia with that. With the Chinese spy he can portray himself as the victim. As I've said elsewhere, with billionaire corporate security and the support of the US government, It's astounding to me that this happened at all.
Also I'm reminded of this quote [1]:
> If you find two ants in your kitchen, the best estimate of the total number of ants in your kitchen is not two
[1]: https://x.com/_NathanCalvin/status/2084856543561093535
xnx | 8 hours ago
lightedman | 8 hours ago
Hah. He doesn't have a prenup. That's going to lead to serious enough consequences for him in divorce court.
adev_ | 8 hours ago
For someone not familiar with American law: How the fuck is that a bigger problem than the Chinese spy ?
Is there any explicit rules at NVidia forbidding that in a code of conduct somewhere ?
yesb | 6 hours ago
bossyTeacher | 8 hours ago
You really think Nvidia would let Huang go (without a replacement matching his skills, experience and knowledge in the field) because he cheated with an employee? It is the spy affair while Huang promoted an open export policy.
Plus thanks to Huang, Nvidia is now under investigation by federal agencies.
None of them care about a CEO cheating.
Also, being fired from the company you founded is a serious consequence.
LastTrain | 9 hours ago
ChrisRR | 9 hours ago
criddell | 9 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | 8 hours ago
A famous guy had an island and it was extrajudicially a place where alot of powerful people internationally could come to his island and interchange info and ideas and make deals and things could occur and he collected up all that kind of stuff, including arms deals and the sex stuff.
But Americans are only right now aware of the sex stuff in what he collected up.
The sex stuff is essentially a distraction, the oily film on the deeper ocean of truth.
ChrisRR | 7 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | an hour ago
cowlevel | an hour ago
Choad_20261104 | an hour ago
fsnovask | 9 hours ago
But yeah, the affairs are probably just a last straw.
coldtea | 9 hours ago
That's not the reason either.
They never did it in a way that was technically legal iirc. And the new administration allowed the exports later anyway and lifted the AI ban on July 2025.
Even she was a spy, the idea is that what? I can understand her snooping for fresh confidential info, in that, case, but what would her role be the sanctions? That just because he got her as gf, he made nvidia evade exports as a favor?
As if it was his personal bypass and not what the nvidia board wanted for the $$$?
They're likely worried about the optics of it, and what a Democrat administration, or increased power, would do to Nvidia stocks with such scandal as leverage.
combobyte | 6 hours ago
If Jensen knew that Megaspeed was a Chinese front, then he willfully engaged in a criminal conspiracy to circumvent US export controls. That is very serious felony.
I know it's just speculation, but the fact that Nvidia hasn't tried to scapegoat some random compliance officer strongly suggests to me that Jensen did know, and that the board has seen the paper trail that proves it.
jMyles | 9 hours ago
...maybe. Or maybe not. Consistency in application of the law is not exactly at an all-time high right now.
zerr | 9 hours ago
bartender26 | 9 hours ago
TheTrueAres | 9 hours ago
pwthornton | 9 hours ago
anon291 | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
seydor | 9 hours ago
What changed is the publicity about the affair. So this is about the affair.
lastofthemojito | 9 hours ago
So for example, a stolen Porsche could end up being driven by a Russian oligarch.
Porsche is not on the hook for this. The car was stolen by a third party.
If a Porsche exec instead had sex with the thief and tossed them the keys to a brand new 911, then they might be on the hook for violating sanctions.
stetrain | 8 hours ago
Betelbuddy | 9 hours ago
NVDA at $151 right now...I never expected to see the day...
jonathanstrange | 9 hours ago
The future will be commoditized local AI anyway, so it doesn't matter in the long run. I just needed to rant a bit about the US hypocrisy in that matter.
uxp100 | 9 hours ago
eecc | 8 hours ago
throwaway27448 | 9 hours ago
We've really run this term into the ground, haven't we? They don't even bother to try to convince us that China wants to hurt us anymore before making our lives shitty for it.
throwaway2037 | 9 hours ago
(1) actively assisting/violating the export ban. There is no evidence, nor any ongoing gov't investigation regarding this accusation.
(2) buyers redirecting legitimate, legal purchases to mainland Chinese companies. There is evidence and multiple ongoing gov't investigations by (a) Department of Justice, (b) Federal Bureau of Investigation, and (c) Department of Commerce.
I cannot find any senior Nvidia executives that have been charged with crimes for directly assisting/violating the export ban. That said, there may be ongoing gov't investigations, but I could not find any public press about them.
outside1234 | 9 hours ago
Andrew_nenakhov | 9 hours ago
outside1234 | an hour ago
phyalow | 9 hours ago
cataphract | 9 hours ago
Are they though? As long as they're in the good graces of Trump, is the Justice Department going to do anything about it?
nemomarx | 8 hours ago
rzerowan | 9 hours ago
In any case pushing him out allows a freer hand for their shenanigans , so well know shortly what the asks were that he pushed back on (kill switches in chips?) if they get announced.
Also his role will be difficult to fill , seeing as hes had biz/gov relations going back decades with all relevant players in the semi industry from design ,litho,fabs to packaging etc.
icyfox | 9 hours ago
giancarlostoro | 9 hours ago
qmr | 8 hours ago
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
speedylight | 7 hours ago
famouswaffles | 3 hours ago
dyauspitr | 9 hours ago
boringg | 9 hours ago
This story has more to it that will come to light .. I'm sure of it.
christkv | 9 hours ago
Gamer Nexus looked at it like a year ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1H3xQaf7BFI
Roark66 | 9 hours ago
This seems very silly.
In all likelihood he got sacked for all those things, the affairs just were a convenient excuse.
What board would admit two thirds of their revenue is imaginary money. It's much better to sack a CEO for being "unfaithful to his wife".
martiverse | 9 hours ago
spiralpolitik | 9 hours ago
The second affair was fatal to Jensen Haung. An affair with a direct report is generally a no-no in modern business and would have opened Nvidia up for all kinds of liability issues if they knew in any capacity. If he stayed it would have made a mockery of their code of conduct rules and opened Nvidia up to further legal issues.
the_duke | 9 hours ago
And Jensen isn't just any CEO, he is the founder and has run the company for thirty years.
He would have survived the affairs if it wasn't for the export control violation aspects.
directevolve | 8 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
evantbyrne | 8 hours ago
BeFlatXIII | 7 hours ago
busymom0 | 5 hours ago
brentm | 9 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | 8 hours ago
root_axis | 9 hours ago
People refuse to understand it. Every single thread is full of the same comments. People are obsessed with culture wars.
dominotw | 9 hours ago
mullingitover | 8 hours ago
Remind me: when did Huang direct NVDA funds to the Trump ballroom fund?
curt15 | 8 hours ago
apercu | 8 hours ago
weryberl5 | 8 hours ago
tsunamifury | 8 hours ago
uncivilized | 8 hours ago
If the second affair didn’t come out, this wouldn’t be a discussion.
sparklingmango | 8 hours ago
dreamcompiler | 8 hours ago
Speculation here, but it's conceivable that China gave Jensen an ultimatum: Give us your chips and we'll delay invading your homeland for a little while longer. Of course this would have been implied since China never says anything so direct.
qurren | 8 hours ago
The more sane explanation is that Jensen Huang just wanted to capture more revenue.
retwakm4 | 3 hours ago
Abuse of power in the case of the second affair to the extent it could've easily turned into a rape scandal and is a big reason why it is a big HR no-no, and in the first case, the affair not being public is exactly the kind of thing a honeypot wants in order to keep you quiet about the kinds of threats that may end up implied.
Either way, the dude is going to be getting investigated and will not be able to effectively lead NVIDIA in the course of what's coming.
perrygeo | 8 hours ago
For reference, the US has sentenced violators of export laws to decades of prison or even execution in extreme cases (when the Rosenburgs leaked nuclear secrets in 1953, they were sentenced to death). It's just shy of treason, legally. This is maybe one of the largest and most consequential intelligence breaches in history. Anyone who thinks this about an extramarital affair really isn't paying attention. Buckle up, its gonna get bumpy.
foobarian | 8 hours ago
Grimburger | 7 hours ago
WarmWash | 8 hours ago
Trump knew about this in late 2025 and decided not to act.
The reasoning is believed to be because of the idea that if China didn't get Nvidia chips, it would just develop it's own chips faster. So holding the belief that China would end up in the same spot no matter what, it would be preferable to get them to pay Nvidia along the way.
Delving a bit deeper into conspiracy
It's also possible that Trump saw it as a silent favor to Jinping, who took the opportunity to return the favor months later by cutting Chinese oil purchases. One hand washes the other and all that.
gabucino | 8 hours ago
wong?
gizajob | 8 hours ago
It would have been simpler and more profitable to sell China the GPUs.
One woman from the CCP just burned a couple of trillion out of your 401Ks. Have you said thank you even once? Are you sick of winning yet?
irthomasthomas | 8 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | 8 hours ago
larodi | 8 hours ago
randyrand | 8 hours ago
That suggests no treason.
zuInnp | 8 hours ago
burnte | 8 hours ago
ux266478 | 8 hours ago
Law has to be enforced by human beings to be meaningful. Donald Trump, who is the one who put the export control in place and has the power to make any legal trouble vanish, has very loudly signaled that he does not care and Jensen/Nvidia will not be in any hot water.
skullone | 8 hours ago
xyst | 8 hours ago
Choad_20261104 | 8 hours ago
dark ops [well, maybe these are really very bright out in the open ops...!!!] may have taken an opportunity and now the operation is at its close, the data is reduced, and the devices utilized are being obsoleted, and operatives burned
we US citizens should not let naivete overrule the gravity of this technology race, on the order of the nuclear arms race
shevy-java | 8 hours ago
matwood | 8 hours ago
If it was just affairs, he could likely have survived this.
NetMageSCW | 7 hours ago
matwood | 4 hours ago
Of course, but perception matters.
illwrks | 8 hours ago
gosub100 | 8 hours ago
jethro_tell | 8 hours ago
Lots of this has been known since may, and it sounds like the president was informed she was a spy a year ago.
One wonders if this happened now since the Dems took control of the investigation bodies.
If they had not, would they have kept right on as is?
speak_plainly | 8 hours ago
Underestimating China under this export ban is a huge historical blunder of epic proportions. China will develop all their own chips and put everyone out business eventually.
mosura | 8 hours ago
The reality is a lot of people want to ensure only approved “safe and aligned” models are trained and executed, and nvidia were, by far, the biggest promoter of the idea of freedom. This will be done by forcing you to rent capacity from approved providers that monitor and watermark everything.
Huggingface are almost certainly next in line for a push to lock down. For child safety, obviously.
aimanbenbaha | 7 hours ago
So something very strange going on here, along with the timing, in time where Anthropic is preparing for an IPO and briefly after the midterms where the median voter rejected AI wholesale. I suspect this might have been a long game to turn the man down that is standing for open-source and the freedom to build AI. Heck epstein was having a ring of elites diddling minors and nothing scandalous came out of it.
All the regulators that kickstarted this dumb export controls in 2022, which in-turn made the american AI-stack weaker vs China, while also using doomer-fud about safety must feel glorious right now.
Sad day for developers.
avidruntime | 5 hours ago
LightBug1 | 7 hours ago
NVIDIA is important and Jensen's a billionaire ... we're talking a little bit of media scrutiny for a few weeks, a little embarrassment for Jensen, some heartache for his family, and that's it. This will then be consigned to the footnotes of history.
His PR company right now are just saying, say nothing, lay low, we'll handle it.
I still think it would have been far easier for Jensen if he'd given the lady a horse. I understand that's the going rate in the US right now.
hintymad | 7 hours ago
That means American companies will have to rely on Anthropic. And interestingly, Anthropic loves to tell users what they can or can not do, such as "The training of Fable 5.2 and Mythos 5.2 included measures to limit advances in a narrow set of capabilities that could most directly accelerate AI development, like accelerator kernel optimization".
Interesting times
Reason077 | 7 hours ago
Nvidia sold to companies in Singapore, and then “somehow” the chips got redirected or forwarded on to China.
It’s been known/suspected for years that this was happening, but this Chinese spy scandal does suggest that execs at Nvidia might have known more about what has been going on than they’ve previously admitted.
blueblisters | 7 hours ago
“Sold to China” can mean a lot of things including legitimate entities in Malaysia/Singapore selling cloud computing to companies in those countries that then resell compute to entities in China. Export bans on gpus are inherently impossible to make work unless you police the eventual destination of every byte exiting a datacenter.
flowerlad | 7 hours ago
The second one -- affair with a direct report -- is what he is being fired for. This one is hard for the board to ignore as it directly violates HR rules.
As for the ban for national security reasons, the ban is not super useful because it only prevents hardware from being physically imported into China. If the hardware is physically located in Singapore and Chinese researchers use those machines remotely, the US does not ban that it. If so how meaningful is the ban?
vagab0nd | 6 hours ago
> ban for national security reasons
These don't sound like they are on the same order of magnitude in terms of severity?
flowerlad | 6 hours ago
alkonaut | 6 hours ago
twoodfin | 5 hours ago
Mr. Huang, you’ve admitted that you violated Nvidia’s policy on relations with subordinates. Why should we believe you were faithful to Nvidia’s policy of compliance with national security export controls?
wayeq | 4 hours ago
I don't think that is the least bit difficult for a board to ignore.
MiSeRyDeee | 3 hours ago
Time and time we saw executives having affairs and dodging consequences. Elon Mask, Eric Schmidt, Sergey Brin, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos. All faced much less severe consequences. Definitely not something blow over like this just after a few days it's being reported.
This is a coordinated attack on Jensen and it was very successful.
JumpCrisscross | 2 hours ago
At most companies it does. HP. Intel. McDonald’s.
The only consistent exception is Musk.
That said, I disagree this is why Jensen was fired. The national-security cover-up is a far bigger deal.
flowerlad | an hour ago
Could be, but that requires time to investigate. Banging employee is different because the board would just have to ask Jensen if the reports are true.
JumpCrisscross | an hour ago
True. The combination probably did him in. But I don't think he'd have been fired if he only slept with an employee. Or had a couple affairs. That's just speculation, though.
MiSeRyDeee | 12 minutes ago
Even Bill Clinton faced relatively minor consequences, considering presidents should be held to a higher moral standard
fundad | 2 hours ago
I hope nobody in the presidential administration needs to resign because of their role in the largest scandal in US history but if so, that is what is best for the country.
threethirtytwo | 7 hours ago
The board is voting him out because they can AT any TIME.
If the board liked him, they would wait for the charges to go through. But they don’t like him. Tons of people cheat on their wives and husbands and I’m sure even the fucking board has people that have.
The board doesn’t like him and has been waiting for a way to oust him while not looking incompetent. Why they don’t like him I don’t actually know.
Maybe because he’s Asian? Maybe this is an internal op by the US government to get someone else up there? I don’t know. But I can guarantee that everything your reading is a cover story. There are underlying forces and motivations here at work that we are not able to know.
nostrademons | 7 hours ago
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50464121
fisherjeff | 7 hours ago
grafmax | 7 hours ago
Presumably his replacement will be subservient "enough".
ActorNightly | 6 hours ago
Allows the influence of selection of next CEO that is more aligned with long term Chinese goals. Or punishment for not going along with the plan.
Im not much for conspiracy theories, but if you think about it, in the state that US is in, there is absolutely zero chance US will do anything retaliatory to China if they do spy shit on US soil. China is basically free to play spy games. My guess is that they have their fingers in Anthropic, Amazon, OpenAI, SpaceX, and AMD, and probably other agents within NVIDIA in high places.
Their game is basically rearrange the pieces so eventually China becomes the world number one superpower, while keeping the status quo as much as possible
grafmax | 4 hours ago
atcon | 7 hours ago
bipartisan bill[1] needed to decapitate[2] opposition[3] to expanded controls/moratoria and install “neutral” caretakers[4] until passage
[1] https://www.semafor.com/article/09/10/2026/bipartisan-ai-saf...
[2] https://x.com/brianchau57/status/2120745928722087948
[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49035303
[4] current CFO Kress or former Apple CEO Tim Cook (suggested by president in social media post)
nullbio | 6 hours ago
ks2048 | 4 hours ago
kurtis_reed | 6 hours ago
vonneumannstan | 6 hours ago
This was blatantly obvious. Do we really think Malaysia was using Billions in GPUs on some secret AI project?
kev009 | 6 hours ago
I'd be more inclined to believe the spy thriller narrative if he sent the RTL of their top designs to China. Selling goods is not a one chief op.
rajman187 | 6 hours ago
Of course, not a year went by before the UAE and Saudi invested heavily in the Trump crypto fund and, very coincidentally, the ban was lifted.
Fear not, Cerebras managed to get another investment from OpenAI!
alpineidyll3 | 6 hours ago
hn_submit | 6 hours ago
mv4 | 6 hours ago
Danox | 6 hours ago
nullbio | 6 hours ago
johndhi | 6 hours ago
MadrasThorn | 6 hours ago
jasode | 6 hours ago
If you dissect the timeline of the events and various statements, I think the 2nd affair with a subordinate employee K Powell was the reason to fire Jensen Huang -- more so than the allegations of secretly selling to China.
This is the timeline:
Before Nov 11, it looked like NVIDIA might try to ride out the storm and keep Jensen at the helm especially if they saw that the China accusations and evidence wasn't strong enough to be a problem. Again, it was totally unnecessary for the board to publicly back him up if they had plans to get rid of him because of China allegations. However, the Board of Directors emergency Nov 11 meeting is inconsistent with the Nov 8 statement affirming Jensen's leadership.Nov 8 was coordinated with carefully crafted communications showing that Jensen and BOD were aligned. Contrast with Nov 11 being chaos and an emergency meeting convened.
Reading between the lines, what probably happened is that Jensen didn't come totally clean with the board on Nov 8 and tell them about the 2nd K Powell affair. Instead, the board got totally blindsided and lost trust in him. (Is there another 3rd secret affair he's hiding from us?!?) It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances.
slibhb | 5 hours ago
Yeah, this seems likely. It's also quite possible that he not only "didn't come totally clean" but outright lied to the board i.e. "this was a one-time thing"
DSingularity | 5 hours ago
Powerful interests want Nvidia to change directions and my guess is that they didn’t think that would happen under Jensen.
JumpCrisscross | 5 hours ago
Nvidia’s Board is not a list of power players. They were, until now, largely pliant to Jensen. They flipped because they saw what everyone outside Silicon Valley did—that they personally, and Nvidia broadly, would pay the price for Jensen’s failures and potential crimes if his brand wasn’t severed from Nvidia’s.
formerly_proven | 5 hours ago
dripdry45 | 5 hours ago
wmil | 3 hours ago
Jensen Huang wasn't on board with that so now he's gone.
TheOtherHobbes | 2 hours ago
Huang was famously loyal to the gaming GPU markets, and there's been a subindustry of people running open inference on high-end consumer GPUs.
If NVIDIA kills those product ranges that subindustry will die, AI hardware will be limited to corporates and the small number of individuals who can drop five figures on an AI rig, and open models will become less valuable/dangerous.
Meanwhile I find it hard to believe the board had no idea what was happening and they're suddenly shocked - shocked! - to discover that Huang was plugging his CPU into the corporate motherboard.
dabinat | 3 hours ago
moate | 5 hours ago
So no, it's not literally about his sex life, but pretending like that doesn't factor into the whole things seems like a very strange point for people to keep making. It may not be that 90% of the cause is "he had sex out of his marriage" but it's also not 0% (it surely doesn't make him a "good leader(tm)" if he's having sex with subordinates)
mhb | 5 hours ago
lencastre | 4 hours ago
Viliam1234 | 4 hours ago
Eridanus2 | 2 hours ago
Also, implies anyone not posting on HN forfeits personhood by default
moate | an hour ago
hackboyfly | 4 hours ago
failingforward | 2 hours ago
moate | an hour ago
elictronic | 3 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
Eridanus2 | 2 hours ago
heromal | 5 hours ago
- July 25: Amid the Deepwater Horizon disaster, BP publicly stated that Hayward had the board's full support.
- July 27: BP formally announced that Hayward would step down as CEO, with Robert Dudley replacing him.
Similar situations with Bob Chapek, Travis Kalanick, the Boeing CEO in 2019 when all those crashes were happening, Carol Bartz, Bob Diamond...
cmiles8 | 5 hours ago
sandworm101 | 5 hours ago
unsupp0rted | 5 hours ago
kbenson | 4 hours ago
sailfast | 4 hours ago
ako | 4 hours ago
bobanrocky | 2 hours ago
smithkl42 | 5 hours ago
boplicity | 5 hours ago
I've not fired very many people before, but deception removes any ambiguity as to whether or not someone should be fired.
hnlmorg | 51 minutes ago
Nobody trusted Trump yet he had the loyalty of all the tech giants because they needed him to make money.
And likewise, AI, and thus the global economy, are dependent on Nvidia. So there was no financial incentive for him to leave if it were just a matter of trust over his inability to keep his penis in his pants.
And let’s remember, this isn’t new news. Nvidia have been aware of this for a year already and it wasn’t a problem until recently.
So what’s changed? The obvious big thing is American government. The Democrats have made it very clear that they’re not going to tolerate any more shenanigans. So removing Haung is a great way to reduce the risk of any financial penalties for Nvidia’s deals with China et al.
nostrademons | 5 hours ago
My money is on the CCP, simply because they have more of a motive for it. From all appearances, NVidia was playing ball with the Trump administration. He was a frequent ally of President Trump, Trump supposedly knew about this information for the last year and sat on it, and even the CIA leaks that started it stressed how much Huang had praised the Trump administration. Reportedly they had already voluntarily stopped exports to MegaSpeed [2] as of June 2025. China, however, has a lot more to gain from his departure. It's going to harm NVidia very severely: reportedly he's very hands-on, "the conductor that makes a very complex operation work", and as a founder the whole knowledge pyramid that the company is based upon rests with him. If they want their domestic hardware industry to surpass NVidia, the easiest way to do that is to take out NVidia leadership.
I suspect that he was compromised by both the CIA and CCP, and with tensions rising between them, eventually found a situation where they each wanted him to do different things, and he couldn't satisfy both. Likely the CIA got wind that the CCP was going to move with their leverage, and published to stave that off. This also has the nice side benefit for U.S. power of letting the other side know the extent to which the CIA knows what you're doing, and showing that even the CEO of the richest company on earth is not immune to U.S laws. But it's still a net negative to U.S. power to have Huang out as CEO of NVidia, simply because it's such a net negative to NVidia. This is only a desirable outcome if he's going to be ousted anyway, or if he is otherwise compromised to become a Chinese puppet.
I suspect the role of the second affair was to show the board just how deep the kompromat goes. First affair, okay, it could be an indiscretion that happened in the past, cut ties and do damage control. But if there's a second (and third and fourth and many others?) affair and everybody knows about it, it becomes impossible for Huang to lead the company because everybody has so much leverage on him.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50462327
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50464121
re-thc | 4 hours ago
No they don't. They just lost access to Nvidia chips that they still rely on (even if not said out in the open). Alibaba's stock tanked on the news for example.
> I suspect the role of the second affair was to show the board just how deep the kompromat goes.
The role was to get the agenda off spying and export (the things you'd go to jail for)
throw282722 | 4 hours ago
They would prefer their companies buy local, as it will advance their local semiconductor infrastructure.
However, these companies would prefer Nvidia if they are allowed. All the advances in the past few years are due to advanced chips being restricted, so they had to step up.
re-thc | 4 hours ago
They already do. Local produces maybe >5% of the volume needed. It's NOT prefer or not. It just doesn't exist.
nostrademons | 4 hours ago
Some people believe that the key moat for AI is the model, and under this model (hah) torpedoing NVidia would be bad for China and good for the U.S. because they won't have access to cutting-edge NVidia hardware for model-training. Other people believe the key moat for AI is the hardware, and under this model torpedoing NVidia would be good for China because it'd allow Chinese hardware makers to catch up and bad for the U.S. because it destroys our key competitive advantage.
Interesting that a policy decision depends so heavily on a question of fact, but that isn't unique to this issue. (I suspect that left and right would agree on abortion if they could agree on whether personhood begins at conception or birth, but they don't, so). There's also an element of time preferences here too: it's likely that model training is dominant now, but hardware will be dominant when you project out a few years, and so both factions could be right but on different timescales.
noboostforyou | 5 hours ago
Exactly my read as well. "If you find two ants in your kitchen, the best estimate of the total number of ants in your kitchen is not two."
qzw | 4 hours ago
calacatta | 4 hours ago
GolfPopper | an hour ago
https://glonce.com/nvidia-bankrolls-its-own-customers-the-ec...
bloppe | 4 hours ago
tgma | 4 hours ago
lumost | 4 hours ago
After they caught him in a lie, they may not have been able to not fire him.
zmmmmm | an hour ago
They can't legally not fire him. But they can legally re-hire him after firing him. So ironically the ONLY way he can continue at nVidia is by being fired - we just have to wait a few days and there will be an Altman-like resurrection.
w4der | 4 hours ago
spullara | 4 hours ago
saaaaaam | 3 hours ago
hamdingers | 3 hours ago
saaaaaam | 4 hours ago
More seriously, I was also curious. A quick search seems to say the earliest recent source is https://x.com/_NathanCalvin/status/2084856543561093535
anigbrowl | 2 hours ago
swiftcoder | 2 hours ago
lazyasciiart | 3 hours ago
Telemakhos | 3 hours ago
camgunz | 3 hours ago
kbelder | 3 hours ago
komadori | 3 hours ago
Don't live in Silicon Valley though.
camgunz | 2 hours ago
taftster | an hour ago
smithkl42 | 3 hours ago
https://nypost.com/2026/11/12/business/ousted-nvidia-ceo-jen...
Singletail | 3 hours ago
ragall | 3 hours ago
darepublic | 3 hours ago
throw310822 | 3 hours ago
I don't think this has anything to do with trust. It's absurd not to trust Huang as the best possible CEO for the company that he brought from zero to 5 trillion dollars in value. It's about being afraid of public opinion, and especially fear of being blamed for not taking the expected decision.
user_7832 | 3 hours ago
collabs | 2 hours ago
This is why martyrs are so praised. You have to overcome this instinct of self preservation to give up your life. I suspect most people can't do it in the heat of the moment.
Basically what others have said, it doesn't matter if Jensen is good at his job or even if nVidia prospers under Jensen. I don't think the board members care one lick about that. What matters to them is their own self interest and it takes a lot of experience to realize that executive leadership and even the board does not instinctively value the goals of the organization above their own self interest. I submit this is true because of the massive amount of bribing err I mean incentive alignment that the organization gives in terms of like stock options or bonuses for meeting certain targets.
booty | 2 hours ago
My god, how much more spectacular could his mistakes be? Does he have to eat a baby live on TikTok while proclaiming "transistors are dead, we're going back to vacuum tubes" or something?
There are very few human beings in history who could have taken nVidia from zero to megatrillions like he did, but the idea of him continuing to run the company after this is absolute absurdity.
DeluluDon | 2 hours ago
saidnooneever | an hour ago
booty | an hour ago
it took a vagina. it literally just took a vagina.
saidnooneever | 54 minutes ago
everyone can be fished.
the simple fact China had to deploy an operative to get yo him means he and Nvidia are well secured. its an expensive and risky option, not the first by far and intelligence agency would take to get to someone.
go shout in all caps in call of duty -_-
throw310822 | 2 hours ago
They know that media and politicians were asking for his head, and that it was riskier for their own asses to resist than to concede. It's that simple.
oytis | 2 hours ago
I dunno, I bet the stocks would recover from the affair in less than a month. That they will recover from losing Huang as the CEO is less certain.
fer | an hour ago
officeplant | 2 hours ago
He can barely stay coherent to reality during interviews and on stage. Especially when the AI generated slides don't make sense.
coderenegade | 56 minutes ago
joering2 | 3 hours ago
Huang betrayed 38 years of trust his wife put into him and recently betrayed the Board by lying to them. That's already admitted, no ifs or buts. He clearly had reasons, as he is a sane person. His reasons were romantic engagement with (alleged) spy. Since he is a sane person, he must have weighed pros and cons and still engage in an affair, even though it jeopardized his marriage and his job. The Board needs to do bunch of "what ifs" in such situation, including paranoid ones, such as "what if this woman had such access to NVIDIA tech stack that each cheap is infused with some form of Chinese virus". We simply don't know how far this goes, but this firing certainly shows much further than just a consequence of a romantic fling.
RajT88 | 2 hours ago
Sane people still make irrational decisions.
It's one of the weird dichotomies of our species.
zapkyeskrill | an hour ago
swiftcoder | 2 hours ago
booty | 2 hours ago
But.
He put together a string of frankly insane mistakes that are now endangering that 5 trillion dollar company from both the inside and outside. There's no chance in hell that they're going to go from $5T back to 0, but you are not understanding the trouble they're in.
Internally, boinking your direct reports (who also happened to have a string of recent promotions) is incredibly ruinous to a company's internal culture, destroying notions of internal meritocracy. How would you feel if all your hard work was apparently not as important as putting out for the CEO? Do you think that would make you eager to do your best work for that CEO? And that's even before thinking about the insane legal liability.
Externally, he got honeypotted by a foreign government and managed to simultaneously mess with national security and, it seems, circumvent export controls to the tune of tens of billions of dollars. nVidia is in some extremely serious shit, and will have the government breathing down their necks between now and the end of time.
bluegatty | an hour ago
Jensen is actually extremely well respected by his staff and has the highest staff approvals in almost all of tech.
I'm certain that his personal foibles won't engender him any love, but it's not unheard of.
Elon Musk has had sexual relations with at least 4 staffers, children with one - while he was having children with his wife.
Where's the scandal?
"he got honeypotted by a foreign government and managed "
Where is the evidence of this? Give me one specific allegation?
His mistress was passing information to the government, ok, as will many nationals that have met with him, and as US nationals often do as well.
Elon is in direct contact with Putin several times a year since 2022 - and there's no good reason for that.
Consider putting all of that in context vis-a-vis much of the rest of corporate America and consider the rest of his contributions.
Obviously it's fair to bring all of this up, but it's intensely hypocritical for the most part.
WillPostForFood | an hour ago
https://archive.ph/c4kmF
---
Next to the Nvidia chief was a woman named Huang Le, or Alice Huang, an executive of a Singapore-based data center company called Megaspeed, which was poised to buy $2 billion of Nvidia A.I. technology over the next year. Though Ms. Huang and Megaspeed are little-known players in the A.I. industry, their association with Nvidia and its chief executive has recently become a preoccupation in Washington.
Commerce Department officials have been investigating whether Megaspeed, which has close ties to Chinese tech firms, is helping companies in China sidestep American export restrictions, according to more than a half dozen current and former officials and other people familiar with the companies, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an examination that is not public.
The inquiry, which is active, calls into question how closely Nvidia is tracking where its A.I. chips end up and highlights the possibility of American export laws easily being sidestepped. Megaspeed is also facing scrutiny from Singaporean police, who told The New York Times in a statement that they are investigating the company for breaching local laws, without elaborating further.
bluegatty | 38 minutes ago
It's absurd to suggest that Nvidia would need to secretly ship a handful of chips to some sketchy actor when Nvidia chips have a a mile a line long for sales.
Jensen can sell his inventory 10x over. You have to have buying power just to get a hold of them.
Anything is possible but it would be extra stupid for one of the smartest people in the world to risk everything for literally no reason at all.
coderenegade | an hour ago
DoesntMatter22 | an hour ago
NuclearPM | 3 hours ago
wonnage | 3 hours ago
Perfect timing: https://www.reuters.com/technology/former-nvidia-ceo-huang-h...
DannyBee | 3 hours ago
The lies may be part of it, but if you didn't fire them for the COC/SH violation, you would be in for near infinite liability because it ends up as evidence that the culture from the top was tolerant of violations, etc. THis is not conjecture, it's what has basically always happened in the legal realm when companies try to work around it.
rz2k | 2 hours ago
state_less | 2 hours ago
[1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/former-nvidia-ceo-huang-h...
ultrasounder | an hour ago
gopalakrishnans | an hour ago
gverrilla | an hour ago
SomaticPirate | 2 hours ago
fer | an hour ago
tgma | an hour ago
fidotron | an hour ago
Some people get to have affairs with subordinates, others don't. It's a question of if they have the support of the people pulling the levers or not as to whether it's considered acceptable. Universal rules are for little people, once beyond a certain position they are merely tools for selectively shutting out opposition.
tgma | an hour ago
yodsanklai | an hour ago
In my company, it's explicitly not forbidden, but the relationship has to be disclosed to HR early on (source: yearly training). That being said, I'm not sure what HR is going to do with the information.
adastra22 | an hour ago
EFreethought | an hour ago
jasondigitized | 2 hours ago
sillysaurusx | 5 hours ago
First, polyamory has been gaining popularity. But a lot of poly people I've met keep that strictly secret, because their friends and family wouldn't understand and would judge them harshly.
Second, the problem isn't that he slept with someone other than his wife (we don't know what kind of agreements they have in place, and ENM is a thing in 2026). It's that he slept with a subordinate. And that's a real problem due to the power differential that exists between him and his employees.
So it's not the second affair per se, but bad judgement. Dating at companies should only happen parallel in the hierarchy, not up or down.
What I'm pushing back on is the notion that someone should be judged simply for fucking someone who isn't his wife. There's a reason people keep ENM agreements a secret, due to the judgmental attitude from the public at large.
Hopefully alternative lifestyles will become normalized to the point where our descendants in 30 years will look back on us with the same disappointment that we look back in 1996 gay marriage laws.
ENM among older couples is particularly common. But sure, it's always possible that Jensen was just cheating on his wife without consent. The thing to watch for is whether his wife has expressed unhappiness publicly about the situation. Notice that in articles like https://archive.is/Ubg4k they'll do everything but ask her how she feels. Or if they have, it's possible she's refused to say anything on the topic. That silence means something, and we don't know what. So hold off on the judgments until we have confirmation that she's actually unhappy with it.
itake | 5 hours ago
outside1234 | 4 hours ago
This isn't a story about the sex
sailfast | 4 hours ago
kube-system | 4 hours ago
It's normal for B2B companies screen for this before you even get a demo.
monocasa | 4 hours ago
sillysaurusx | 4 hours ago
For a lot of people, it's about the sex. In fact if you only read the first paragraph, you'd come away thinking it was solely about the sex.
At least on HN the sentiment is more nuanced though, which is good.
qurren | 2 hours ago
kube-system | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
StilesCrisis | 3 hours ago
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
kube-system | 2 hours ago
chasd00 | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
officeplant | 2 hours ago
swatcoder | 5 hours ago
That seems to be the most natural guess based on public information, but it's equally plausible that the board knows more than the public already, whether because they drove investigations, received disclosures from Huang, or received insider tips once the heat started rising. Trust aside, they may already might know worse and more materially or legally impactful things.
That's the kind of thing that a healthy class of professional journalists can help uncover and trace in a way that our post-journalism world is losing the opportunity to do. Even still, I wouldn't be surprised if further scandals for Huang or Nvidia started being reported in coming days and weeks. You might be right that it was just too many sex scandals and general loss of trust, but we just can't expect to know yet.
altairprime | 4 hours ago
lazide | 3 hours ago
altairprime | 3 hours ago
That assumption has not held to date in this presidential cycle, and Jensen Huang has openly had the backing of that president. From a financial perspective, that would considerably lower their financial risk estimate of either having to pay a fine and/or hand over one or two C-level executives for some rich person prison-vacation time. I would assume the board is competent and has verbally, off the record, discussed how many billions of dollars they expect to be fined in the worst case and accepted that as the cost of doing (corrupt) business, but we could get lucky and find they did so with a paper trail that’ll come out in court someday :D
lazide | 59 minutes ago
Coincidence?
altairprime | 29 minutes ago
QuiEgo | 4 hours ago
Reports are just breaking that this is indeed the case.
Betelbuddy | 3 hours ago
cheesecakegood | 3 hours ago
> Jensen Huang had an intimate relationship with a second employee, according to two people familiar with the matter, Reuters has learned... Reuters is not naming the employee.
spyder | 3 hours ago
don't has to be a journalist, it could be a spy too... :-)
clint | an hour ago
zzbzq | 4 hours ago
If we're just going to be purely speculative anyway, it could be the case Jensen is the one who himself leaked the 2nd affair, in order to continue this distraction strategy.
I wouldn't be surprised if 100% of the info we have on this is Jensen's PR. 1) Anonymous "leak" tweets are all PR agency slop -- real jouranalist scoopers would take credit to draw attention to themselves. 2) Any Federal investigators aren't going to say 1 word to the public. Ergo, it was always Jensen trying to keep the narrative on his affairs.
And if you want to be TRULY conspiratorial about it, perhaps one or both of the affairs never existed, only the smuggling.
xnx | 4 hours ago
catchnear4321 | 4 hours ago
There are certain lines CEOs of this level absolutely cannot cross, and a relationship with a subordinate is one of them. Hiding it, putting the entire company at risk for it, a board can’t trust a ceo that puts their extramarital dalliances ahead of the company’s interest.
Chips to China, on the other hand, is in the company’s interest. That’s what lawyers and lobbyists are for, and when they behave enough, that’s also what “rockstar” CEOs are for.
Jensen got too big for his leather jacket. Simple as.
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
catchnear4321 | an hour ago
jmount | 4 hours ago
InexSquirrel | 4 hours ago
If someone has been: 1. Managing the company well 2. Attracting and retaining good talent 3. Making money for shareholders 4. Building strong company fundamentals
Then forcing a resignation over this seems... odd. I was under the impression that barring this infidelity, Huang was one of the more sane tech CEOs. I feel like I could to literally any other CEO (Zuckerburg, Bezos, Musk, Ellison, Gates, Jobs) that have done something equally bad or worse, and haven't had to resign.
pelican0 | 4 hours ago
But in the big picture, isn't it crazy that a relationship between two consenting adults is a bigger deal, and of larger impact to the economy, than an action that is supposedly unlawful and threatened national security?
bigstrat2003 | 4 hours ago
kergonath | 3 hours ago
Plus possible other events known to the board but not us. We’ll know eventually.
lazide | 3 hours ago
Once I worked at a company where the sales VP got caught embezzling by setting up (large amounts of) fake affiliates.
It boosted the overall revenue numbers, and I think they were impressed at how long he had gotten away with it, so they let him be ‘stolen’ by a competitor (who didn’t know the circumstances) while they swept it under the rug.
Easy 8 figures of revenue impact per year.
Pretty ingeniously evil, IMO.
DesaiAshu | 4 hours ago
If an exec is lying about this, what else might they be lying about? Embezzlement? Corruption?
avazhi | 2 hours ago
This batshit insane decision by the board is a timely reminder that prudes inexplicably truly do continue to thrive among us.
Nobody on the planet is better off with this guy resigning.
robotresearcher | 2 hours ago
saidnooneever | an hour ago
gorbachev | 3 hours ago
All 42,000 employees should be held to the same standard, otherwise you will end up with all kinds of problems within the company.
Company leadership should lead by example as well.
ramblurr | 3 hours ago
order-matters | 2 hours ago
Vegenoid | 39 minutes ago
x0x0 | 3 hours ago
1 - did she feel pressured to have a relationship with him? It's hard to have genuinely free consent when he can make or break her career; and
2 - sexual discrimination towards every other employee. Did she get benefits from the relationship? It's more than fair for the rest of the employees to wonder if they'd also been eg sucking his dick if they would have gotten better raises, faster promotions, etc.
unwise-exe | 3 hours ago
dotancohen | 2 hours ago
jychang | 2 hours ago
naniwaduni | 2 hours ago
blobbers | 2 hours ago
All of them are big deals, but being deceived by a spy isn't the same as choosing to break an important rule.
ishtanbul | 3 hours ago
EGreg | 3 hours ago
https://youtu.be/_BypvatagNQ?si=1CDGUZKSd6r3jz_n
nostrademons | 3 hours ago
EGreg | 2 hours ago
varjag | 2 hours ago
peezd | 3 hours ago
bamboozled | 2 hours ago
DivingForGold | 3 hours ago
zmmmmm | 2 hours ago
This is the right line of thinking, but I don't think a second affair is enough. To me, it says there is more we don't know. Possibly a lot more, and a lot worse than a second affair. Apart from anything else, that is the only reason to act this fast. You don't fire a CEO like Jensen in 24 hours over an HR indiscretion.
So I think both you and the parent are correct, but its a combo: he didn't come fully clean, but there is a non-public part that probably looks a lot more like treason that the board knows and we don't.
gokuljs | an hour ago
bluegatty | an hour ago
Something stinks to high heaven here.
Elon Musk has multiple allegations of sexual assault against him - he's had sexual relations with at least 4 of his staff including children with one of them while he had children with another women.
Elon solicits young women over social media to have children with (which is also soliciting sex).
He attacked his own regulators during DOGE, has direct meetings with Putin several times since 2022 (still ongoing), he's taken $100's of Millions in investment from Chinese state banks, special deals re: factories and data capture and sharing rights.
And more.
The difference is that Elon has 1) and iron grip over the board and 2) is an aggressive, spiteful person who will attack anyone and everyone - and everyone lives in fear about saying anything negative about Elon.
Jensen is paying the price for being a nice guy.
Apparently he should have been dragging the board over the coals, and threatening the press and industry to keep quiet, to quash the stories, to kiss up to Trump and make sure there's nothing but love from the government etc. etc..
" It was impossible to keep Jensen under those circumstances"
I'm sorry but this is very not true and ... I don't want to be mean but it's effectively naive.
Elon tells his board whatever he wants to tell them including ridiculous fabrications about products, roadmaps, and handles them with total contempt.
This is game of power, not trust.
mywittyname | 21 minutes ago
Hasn't Musk done this multiple times (including having children with subordinates)? He's still the CEO of a few companies. Bill Gates married one!
Boards don't care about this kind of thing unless they are already looking to get rid of someone. Worst case they pay the person off, and the cost will probably be less than a principal engineer earns in a year.
This doesn't pass the smell test. My guess is damning evidence was discovered which incriminates several high-level individuals at Nvidia with willfully bypassing the export ban. The second affair was leaked as a cover for why they were letting him go.
I'm sure it will all come out after a bit.
quiet_ledger44 | 6 hours ago
ycombinatrix | 5 hours ago
The problem is that Jensen destroyed Nvidia's plausible deniability.
matheusmoreira | 5 hours ago
ChuckMcM | 5 hours ago
superxpro12 | 5 hours ago
zer0zzz | 5 hours ago
iknownthing | 5 hours ago
next_xibalba | 4 hours ago
The second affair with an employee likely just dealt a death blow (if it hadn't already been dealt) to Jensen in terms of his ability to ride the crisis out.
elmer2 | 4 hours ago
If our own government officials can't face justice, why should the CEO of a company?
arppacket | 4 hours ago
gofreddygo | 4 hours ago
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC3Kh40dEQY
necovek | 4 hours ago
If an executive suddenly starts wearing a leather jacket, watch out!
robot | 4 hours ago
He controlled the trade and price for a global asset more valuable than gold as a single person. Some people didn't want that, it's that simple.
robot | 35 minutes ago
hn_submit | 4 hours ago
Insanity | 4 hours ago
ergocoder | 4 hours ago
It's just unlikely that an affair would nuke his CEO's position.
j45 | 3 hours ago
Is rumor and conjecture enough?
simonebrunozzi | 3 hours ago
In 50 years from now, some declassified documents will maybe shed light on this specific incident.
I would imagine it being a form of "So, China, we'll let our Jensen guy sell you X in chips, and in return, you do Y in relation to Russia, and Z in relation to Taiwan. Oh, and we need to use one of your spies, in case someone f*cks up".
FooBarWidget | 3 hours ago
Plus the fact that there's absolutely no evidence that the lady is a spy. All media report anonymous sources but treat the allegations as fact. Singapore said their investigation of the lady is not due to spying, but no western media picked up that story. The lady traveled to Taiwan with her Hong Kong passport, and the Taiwanese govt also said they have no evidence she's a spy. The Chinese spy agency just started investigating her due to all the commotion (likely for smuggling chips, which China also doesn't want, see above), and also has no idea who she is. Despite all this, the public still treats the spy allegations as a fact.
Jenssen Huang is a victim. Those who wanted to get rid of him and set this up, have succeeded. But everyone is under the mistaken belief that this hurts China somehow. China doesn't give a damn. In the mean time, all Chinese Americans lose. Jenssen is not the first such victim, and won't be the last.
p00ki3 | 3 hours ago
"Trump/GOP lost their ass in midterms!" and "Dems intend to investigate GOP/Trump!"
Also provides news channel attacks on Dems; Congress should be looking into national security issues over here in CEO land! Not dividing Congress with partisan hackery!
Important to call out the social engineering going on among all the tribal groups.
rsoto2 | 3 hours ago
DannyBee | 3 hours ago
Like everyone, they have a COC/sexual harassment policy, and that is basically always a firing offense in practice. They cannot place him above it, or else they would be in for infinite liability.
This is why literally nothing mentioned firing until that was discovered, and then it instantly became about firing him.
Datsundere | 2 hours ago
curtisblaine | 2 hours ago
TulliusCicero | 2 hours ago
Sleeping with a Chinese spy or subordinate turns a personal problem into a workplace problem.
bluegatty | 2 hours ago
You could be right, but you're putting way , way too much faith in the board etc.
These people can be clowns. Don't over estimate how ridiculous, petty, thin skinned and arbitrary boards can be.
fmajid | an hour ago
protocolture | an hour ago
Of course they are why wouldnt they.
>NATIONAL SECURITY REASONS
Clipper Chip Mark 5 nonsense.
BLKNSLVR | an hour ago
It's an odd situation where, yes, they're breaching national security mandates, but they're also being protected by the man at the top of the organization that makes those national security mandates.
We're living in a comedy film, where the outcome of said comedy film has an effect on the world economy, so we're actually living in a tragedy film.
That's how corruption skews the reality that the powerless are forced to live within.
zelphirkalt | 16 minutes ago
kilroy123 | 9 hours ago
ExoticPearTree | 9 hours ago
sangeeth96 | 9 hours ago
kilroy123 | 9 hours ago
If the company struggles without him and it's obvious they need his leadership, he'll be back. Morals be damned.
sangeeth96 | 8 hours ago
Now, back to the main point: your egregious comparison of a potential Huang-return to Jobs-return unfortunately still remains just as terrible.
rationalist | 4 hours ago
OP wasn't talking about his morals, unless you think OP is on Nvidia's board.
mirmor23 | 2 hours ago
Here is some reading material to clear up your ignorance:
When Chrisann Brennan became pregnant with their daughter, Lisa, in 1977, Jobs was a young man in his early twenties just as Apple was beginning to take off.
According to Brennan, Jobs reacted with dismay and anger to the news, and they never married. Furthermore, for several years, Jobs denied that he was the father, even going as far as claiming in court documents that he was sterile.
A court-ordered DNA paternity test eventually proved conclusively that he was Lisa's father, after which he was required to provide financial support.
keeda | 5 hours ago
baobabKoodaa | 5 hours ago
TechSquidTV | 9 hours ago
Taek | 9 hours ago
Like, maybe him stepping down is the right decision. But it feels like a hit job and something that was pushed through, rather than something that was properly considered as what is actually best for the company.
ASinclair | 9 hours ago
trvrprkr | 9 hours ago
frabjoused | 9 hours ago
calcifer | 9 hours ago
What's your definition? People he sold a GPU to at extortionate markups?
cj | 9 hours ago
mapcars | 9 hours ago
ARandumGuy | 9 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
Ask someone in Bangladesh who the fuck Harriet Tubman is.
jcranmer | 7 hours ago
Schiendelman | 5 hours ago
yoyohello13 | 7 hours ago
saturn8601 | 7 hours ago
I hope I am wrong but I am starting to think the US left is about to walk into a historical economic collapse that they are inevitably increasing the chances of by 'doing the right thing'.
shimman | 9 hours ago
loceng | 9 hours ago
I suspect you hypocritically have and will continue to benefit from his work that he started as their CEO 33 years ago.
RunSet | 8 hours ago
I hope this kicks the legs out from under the "circular financing"[0] that has enabled slop to permeate seemingly everything good about computing.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Check_kiting
DoctorDabadedoo | 8 hours ago
I'll be sure to tell that to my kids while I put them to bed today.
loceng | 4 hours ago
DoctorDabadedoo | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
loceng | 26 minutes ago
This is called a straw man argument, nobody claimed such.
sire-vc | 9 minutes ago
trvrprkr | 9 hours ago
I honestly don't care. It's not a balance sheet to me.
Topfi | 9 hours ago
63stack | 9 hours ago
edent | 9 hours ago
A surgeon who saves a thousand lives doesn't get a pass for the one murder they commit.
If the person who eventually cures cancer also happens to be a rapist, do you remember their name with awe or pity?
The sort of Felicific Calculus practiced by the "Effective" Altruists is a tawdry trick designed to excuse despicable behaviour.
WinstonSmith84 | 9 hours ago
frabjoused | 9 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
deaton | 2 hours ago
233mhz | 9 hours ago
You don't get to cheat on your wife, company and country and get support lmao, what a strange things to say.
gizajob | 9 hours ago
Some very harsh words being thrown around for Jensen’s very human failings. Try walking in his shoes, or at least having some degree of understanding and empathy.
tranceylc | 9 hours ago
gizajob | 9 hours ago
sumeno | 7 hours ago
tranceylc | 5 hours ago
fuussssip | 9 hours ago
gizajob | 9 hours ago
And you’re a bot so as if you’d know.
ceejayoz | 8 hours ago
You're choosing to argue with strangers on the Internet while on said beach. Your life could be easier.
Huang is choosing to make his life easier by resigning, and has the resources to do the beach thing - at essentially infinite luxury - indefinitely.
gizajob | 8 hours ago
fuussssip | 4 hours ago
shimman | 9 hours ago
ceejayoz | 9 hours ago
Chances are I could just sell them and live for a year or ten off it.
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/17/leather-jacket-worn-by-nvidi...
Which illustrates the gap between his life's challenges and everyone else's nicely, IMO.
neilsimp1 | 9 hours ago
b112 | 9 hours ago
He could have done a wrong thing. Or the affair could have been perfectly fine with his wife. Or the marriage could have been on the rocks for years, and they both agreed to not divorce, with all the drama and media attention, and just live their own lives.
But you know all this is true, or not true.
Yes?
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
win311fwg | 9 hours ago
verdverm | 9 hours ago
It could be argued much of that is performative. The most vocal group for this in America voted for someone who is well known to break oaths.
win311fwg | 9 hours ago
notThrowingAway | 9 hours ago
yulaow | 9 hours ago
booty | 9 hours ago
But in this case, Huang himself explicitly mentioned the hurt that he caused his family. I don't think it gets much clearer than this.
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/11/08/nvidia-jensen-huang-email-bo...mapcars | 9 hours ago
Even if his wife doesn't care it would be wise to keep this apology style, rather than try to go with cliche "its not as bad as it looks".
iammrpayments | 9 hours ago
jkahrs595 | 9 hours ago
throwayay58373 | 9 hours ago
thehappypm | 9 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
MisterMunchkin | 4 hours ago
joebig | 2 hours ago
jfckenfishf | 9 hours ago
bigfishrunning | 9 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
trentor | 9 hours ago
jfckenfishf | 9 hours ago
The world as a whole is pretty conservative, people like to project the happily married couple image regardless of reality of the relationship.
trentor | 9 hours ago
joshstrange | 9 hours ago
I don't understand what compels people to make up scenarios to defend people who have come out and said the opposite.
jfckenfishf | 9 hours ago
nullocator | 8 hours ago
malfist | 4 hours ago
You are, in fact, defending.
nsoam | 9 hours ago
neilsimp1 | 7 hours ago
slekker | 9 hours ago
neilsimp1 | 7 hours ago
Topfi | 9 hours ago
catchnear4321 | 9 hours ago
kennyadam | 9 hours ago
detourdog | 9 hours ago
Arn_Thor | 9 hours ago
bar8uyr | 9 hours ago
netrap | 9 hours ago
K0balt | 9 hours ago
If you think that billionaire execs of highly strategic companies don’t have the CIA nonconsentually implanted in their colon you are extremely naive. He misstepped politically.
I’ve known a lot of execs, and I can probably count the ones that were highly successful and never cheated on their wives on one hand. The temptation comes with the territory, and the opportunities are endless and disarmingly charming. It takes a man of outstanding moral character to be unfailingly perfect under those circumstances, and unfortunately outstanding moral character is often not what gets you into the c-suite. It’s a lot like rockstars in the 70s, actually, but with more boring clothes.
zippyman55 | 9 hours ago
ithkuil | 5 hours ago
hashmap | 9 hours ago
ExoticPearTree | 9 hours ago
So much hate for him, it is sad.
k12sosse | 9 hours ago
amdsn | 9 hours ago
mapcars | 9 hours ago
hashmap | 4 hours ago
sys32768 | 8 hours ago
deaton | 2 hours ago
HolyLampshade | 9 hours ago
I’m sorry but this shows wildly inappropriate decision making. Say what you will about honeypots (I received specialized “warning” early in my career, but I recognize that is abnormal), but we all are forced through training every single year about how relationships at work, especially with imbalanced power dynamics, are inappropriate and should not take place.
I don’t care about the infidelity, but he represents the company at its pinnacle. He had to go.
furyg3 | 9 hours ago
You can agree or disagree with his position on exporting to China being good/bad for nVidia or the US. But actively working closely with a company (Megaspeed) where, from a thousand miles away, it was clear that their primary goal was to get around and/or bend US export controls... that's a bad idea. Megaspeed was clearly working for the direct benefit of the Chinese government.
Add onto that having an extramarital affair with the representative of that company? Come on, it's extremely likely she's an agent of China, and if not it's a gigantic business risk.
Then, on top of that, you have to remember that he's married. A divorce results in half of his shares going to his wife, who would then have a grudge, probably not in the best interests of the comapny.
MattDaEskimo | 9 hours ago
Not a single inch of empathy for his wife and family, nor the misled investors and staff.
34679 | 9 hours ago
The Chinese government wants Chinese companies to buy Chinese chips.
WinstonSmith84 | 9 hours ago
ithkuil | 5 hours ago
iterance | 8 hours ago
1dom | 9 hours ago
His affairs have been going on for months or years, so much so that various places knew about it, did nothing to stop it, and didn't leak it.
I think it's a fair question to ask "why is this all coming out together now?" Nobody seems to know. In the absence of any other explanation, suggesting "hit job" isn't absurd.
esseph | 9 hours ago
1. Got too well known to hide
2. Republicans just badly lost the midterms. There is a lot of info that the President and head of Department of Commerce also knew about all of this the entire time and did nothing. They won't be able to stop investigations, and they don't want to be seen as getting in the way of them.
If that's true, the bigger story is not just that Jensen did all this, but that the administration likely knew he was guilty of Espionage and actually helped facilitate it by knowing but not acting. That is a real possibility.
To clarify, there is a possibility that the President of the United States and members of his team knowingly concealed and aided Conspiracy and Espionage against the United States.
OnlyLys | 8 hours ago
CodeArtisan | 9 hours ago
godockly | 8 hours ago
worldsavior | 9 hours ago
realmanrealmanu | 9 hours ago
yokoprime | 9 hours ago
KaiserPro | 9 hours ago
I mean yes, he shouldn't be hounded, but if he'd kept it in his pants, he could have avoided all this nastiness.
WhitneyLand | 9 hours ago
However let’s hold both thoughts at once, this was no hit job. Nvidia was forced to act quickly to mitigate business and legal risks. The eventual fallout they’ll face is still not fully known.
esseph | 9 hours ago
Oh know, the consequences of my own actions have found me!
> But it feels like a hit job and something that was pushed through, rather than something that was properly considered as what is actually best for the company.
BUT THE COMPANY WON'T SOMEONE THINK ABOUT THE COMPANY
eqmvii | 9 hours ago
I have a lot more sympathy for the victims, not the arsonist!
ex-aws-dude | 5 hours ago
sceptic123 | 9 hours ago
The idea his fall is related to his affair also seems more like an attempt to minimise the fact that NVIDIA have been covertly selling to China when they were not supposed to.
uludag | 9 hours ago
Jensen, if you are reading this and need support you can try looking into BetterHelp. You can even get 20% off using certain partner links. No one should have to go through the stress of loosing their job from Chineese spies alone and with BetterHelp you're just one click away from your very own personal therapist.
avgDev | 8 hours ago
ex-aws-dude | 8 hours ago
Are you serious?
asadotzler | 7 hours ago
alt227 | 5 hours ago
I for one hope all humans are ok, regardless of their status.
specked-citrus | 6 hours ago
He's worth like $140 billion. $70 billion if he gets divorced. He'll be fine.
htrp | 9 hours ago
lenerdenator | 9 hours ago
I'm not familiar with the thing I'm seeing.
Might call my financial advisor and ask him to buy some shares. They'll be lower, and the board has shown it can actually protect the interests of shareholders.
Joel_Mckay | 9 hours ago
The real question we must ask is if a current $30k consumer GPU that initially sold for $2.7k is just as inflated as the 'AI' holdings revenue predictions.
The smart money will wait till the legal mess starts, as the dead cat bounce in the panic sell off is probable as people try to buy the dip. ymmv =3
lvl256 | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
fridder | 8 hours ago
ACCount39 | 9 hours ago
piker | 9 hours ago
fernandotakai | 9 hours ago
i wonder what will happen to nvidia's relationship with TMSC now.
kccqzy | 7 hours ago
DaSHacka | 8 hours ago
But even then, the original Switch 1 homebrew relied on an oversight in NVIDIA's Tegra chip that blew open the whole platform due to the ability to execute unsigned code. The Switch 1 was actually pretty locked down. Nintendo worked hard on securing it properly, only for it to all be for naught due to their SoC vendor making a massive blunder.
I wish I could have seen what was said in the meetings between the two companies when the first Switch exploit was released, considering it was fully on NVIDIA.
burnte | 7 hours ago
_whiteCaps_ | 7 hours ago
bluepeter | 9 hours ago
throw03172019 | 9 hours ago
DaSHacka | 8 hours ago
lolcatzlulz | 9 hours ago
jmathai | 9 hours ago
This includes his family and the family of those involved in the affair. Many lives were turned upside down.
iterance | 8 hours ago
alt227 | 6 hours ago
alt227 | 8 hours ago
In 10 years he will have a new family and new friends and this will be a distant memory for him.
falsemyrmidon | 8 hours ago
alt227 | 6 hours ago
hn_submit | 6 hours ago
Trump will get away with everything he's done. Rubio, Vance, Kennedy and Hegseth won't.
hackmack10 | 4 hours ago
hn_submit | 4 hours ago
nemomarx | 4 hours ago
https://www.criminallawlibraryblog.com/preemptive-pardons-co...
deltoidmaximus | 4 hours ago
Well, there's a first time for everything I guess. Trump can just pardon them in return for a bribe after all.
pphysch | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
ChrisGreenHeur | 9 hours ago
Apparently I am able to, what was that?
jansan | 9 hours ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYWzMvlj2RQ
gpugreg | 9 hours ago
ndiddy | 9 hours ago
gryn | 8 hours ago
after the 2 faulty products in a row, I haven't bought an apple product since.
arjie | 8 hours ago
slantyyz | 8 hours ago
OisinMoran | 7 hours ago
Rodmine | an hour ago
This is truly the year of the Linux pcs and you’re missing out running anything else.
vrmiguel | 7 hours ago
Maybe that's the lesson he learned and why he _supposedly_ was making sure his GPUs were still getting to China. Because he knows that the alternative would lead to good Nvidia Chinese competitor later on
KingMob | 9 hours ago
Pretty sure all those nVidia employees over the years had a bigger hand in building it.
stonedivot | 9 hours ago
verdverm | 9 hours ago
cyh555 | 8 hours ago
verdverm | 8 hours ago
The idea that only one person matters is a plague on society
thecosas | 9 hours ago
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/11/21/graveyards-full/
yubblegum | 8 hours ago
marcusverus | 8 hours ago
jvwww | 6 hours ago
driverdan | 9 hours ago
Why? He caused this. He chose to have affairs with a spy and a subordinate. Now he has to deal with the consequences.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
bdelmas | 7 hours ago
prewett | 2 hours ago
At least that's only hypocrisy (assuming you are not, in fact, actually a saint--you might have developed habits and values that mean you are not likely to sin in that way.) At some level it's not even a problem: you want to aspire to be a better person than you are right now, which means you will hold values that you do not currently measure up to.
But thinking you are a saint because you have empathy is perniciously self-righteous. You can see something similar to this in the progressive movement right now, for instance.
asadotzler | 7 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
asadotzler | 40 minutes ago
DO you feel for how depressed that WW2 dictator was before he took his own life? How sad and lonely the big "H" was? That stirs empathy in you? Not me. I make choices about who I spend my mental and emotional efforts on.
quentindanjou | 7 hours ago
vouwfietsman | 4 hours ago
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
But you shouldn't have empathy because you like him or anything.
You should have empathy when he proves he's changed. You can make mistakes, we all do. You don't deserve empathy.
He sells GPUs, he's not a rockstar.
onidj | 8 hours ago
doublerabbit | 7 hours ago
It does remain possible; he's a parasite and someone who's just had an affair. He wouldn't value the sympathy given, Neither himself or Nvidia would return the gesture.
They give null shit about you.
> He's one of the richest men on the planet, he's acted with hubris and ignominy, he's betrayed his loved ones, and he's also probably feeling pretty terrible right now.
He chose to have the affair and as having my father do the same to my mother; you get no sympathy for cheating. Let them feel pretty terrible, maybe they will find what it's like to be human for a change.
Nothing more than a parasite in the corporate playground. His actions caught up with him; woe is me. What will I ever do with so much money.
onidj | 5 hours ago
doublerabbit | 3 hours ago
Changing everything to get out from rock bottom.
Some billionaire cheats on their wife and I am suppose to mourn for them?
You want me to be empathetic for a sociopath? Blow me.
onidj | an hour ago
I think you have misunderstood me. I'm not telling you to feel anything and I'm not going to sleep tonight feeling sad for Jensen Huang either.
LetsGetTechnicl | 7 hours ago
alt227 | 5 hours ago
LetsGetTechnicl | 4 hours ago
tylerjharden | 4 hours ago
LetsGetTechnicl | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
spike021 | 7 hours ago
based on the reporting about the second affair, it's possible his security has had to shut down similar witnesses in the past.
sparklingmango | 7 hours ago
subarctic | 7 hours ago
claaams | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
lvl256 | 5 hours ago
laurels-marts | 5 hours ago
rsoto2 | 3 hours ago
nozzlegear | 8 hours ago
seiru | 8 hours ago
BeFlatXIII | 6 hours ago
troyvit | 4 hours ago
Me too. If he needs somebody to take his place he can reach me at my HN profile page. I'll take the bullet and try to struggle through with just billions of dollars.
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
mynti | 9 hours ago
gizajob | 9 hours ago
jazzypants | 9 hours ago
gizajob | 9 hours ago
cogman10 | 9 hours ago
This is a CYA move by the board as all this is becoming public.
everfrustrated | 9 hours ago
ihumanable | 8 hours ago
They did ~$90B in revenue last quarter.
I sometimes can't imagine the avarice it takes to do things like this. Could you imagine having a $100 bill in your hand and going "Yea, I'll break the law and possibly destroy my life to steal $7.50"
muddi900 | 7 hours ago
Another way to put it is the difference between 75 MILLION and 7.5 BILLION is rounded to 7.4 BILLION.
The scale of numbers is huge and it is not just another 7.5 billion dollars.
treacherous | an hour ago
It's worse than that. Much much much worse than plain greed. Supply of manufacturing capacity for this kind of hardware is severely limited. TSMC can't produce enough to meet all that demand. NVIDIA not selling 7.5B worth of chips to China does not mean they would lose the 7.5B worth of chips. They could have sold them to American companies, which are all in a frenzy to build datacenters.
No, this is just a classic case of treachery. Jensen Huang, whether bought, blackmailed or because of tribalism, has decided to support China. In an interview, he was getting very angsty when someone asked him why sell chips to China, and said "victimizing them, turning them into an enemy, likely isn't the best answer":
https://youtu.be/Hrbq66XqtCo?t=3517
People refuse to believe it when it's a billionaire, but they too can be very tribal, even if they lived most of their life in the so called melting pot of the United States of America.
Traster | 9 hours ago
thewhitetulip | 8 hours ago
anon7725 | 5 hours ago
Sounds like this was known or suspected at the highest levels of the administration (Rubio was discussing it per recent reporting). So the question becomes: did Nvidia use a cut out to knowingly avoid the export ban, and if so, did the administration know this?
nix-zarathustra | 4 hours ago
United857 | 8 hours ago
newsclues | 8 hours ago
A relationship with a foreign agent
An inappropriate relationship with a subordinate
Two of these potentially have serious legal consequences.
jcranmer | 7 hours ago
Starman_Jones | 4 hours ago
hackeraccount | 2 hours ago
jcranmer | an hour ago
nonethewiser | 6 hours ago
Oh sorry Jensen you broke one of the rules in the HR handbook we have to fire you now nothing we can do.
hirako2000 | 6 hours ago
It isn't an arbitrary policy.
JohnMakin | an hour ago
freshtake | 8 hours ago
nonethewiser | 6 hours ago
_bobm | 7 hours ago
raincole | 7 hours ago
anon7725 | 5 hours ago
ferguess_k | 9 hours ago
macinjosh | 9 hours ago
whatever1 | 9 hours ago
hugodan | 9 hours ago
karimf | 9 hours ago
Given the report that the US gov knew about this for a while, it seems more likely that it's coming from the administration?
Arn_Thor | 9 hours ago
This breaking just before a meeting with Trump/Xi and just after the midterms show a changing wind in Washington is a hell of a coincidence—or not.
shimman | 9 hours ago
hurfdurf | 9 hours ago
eqmvii | 9 hours ago
dluan | 7 hours ago
baalimago | 9 hours ago
paxy | 9 hours ago
bbor | 9 hours ago
And I doubt it'll cost him much. What could you pay the founder of the second most valuable company on the planet who already holds $150B in equity? It'd be as absurd as paying Donald Trump.
grey-area | 9 hours ago
So if he held 150B stock say before, now he has 100B.
The rest of the market isn’t looking very solid either.
ksec | 9 hours ago
I am not sure if you and I are looking at the same chart. Down 12% Pre Market.
qwytw | 9 hours ago
Not in premarket so far, 12% down sing yesterday.
Also why would it do better? Overall Huang seems to be a highly competent CEO. Replacing him with someone seems risky (especially if the board is influenced by Trump & co.). Especially given that Nvidia never had any other CEO.
dmurray | 9 hours ago
hackyhacky | 9 hours ago
misiti3780 | 8 hours ago
hobo123 | 9 hours ago
teknologist | 9 hours ago
silverFork | 9 hours ago
dofm | 9 hours ago
ceejayoz | 9 hours ago
The criminal ones might, though.
Yoric | 9 hours ago
silverFork | 9 hours ago
teknologist | 9 hours ago
silverFork | 9 hours ago
mort96 | 9 hours ago
rtkwe | 8 hours ago
jimmyjazz14 | 8 hours ago
saberience | 9 hours ago
I think if you could know the truth, 75% of CEOs in the US probably cheat on their wives. They are not hired to be faithful to their wives, they are hired to increase the stock prices of their companies.
Like sure, if you're a good Christian, it's not good behavior, but ultimately, it's just having sex with someone. I want the guy to make me money and build a great company, I don't care who he has sex with.
fuussssip | 9 hours ago
This isn't just a case of some extramarital sex.
orliesaurus | 8 hours ago
e0n | 9 hours ago
lastofthemojito | 9 hours ago
Could 75% of CEOs in the US help foreign intelligence assets to evade export controls and not face consequences?
twodave | 9 hours ago
dyauspitr | 9 hours ago
KaiserPro | 9 hours ago
Cheating with your direct report leaves you open to blackmail.
Cheating with your fucking customer leaves you open to a whole bunch more trouble.
teknologist | 9 hours ago
vidarh | 9 hours ago
cinntaile | 9 hours ago
qwytw | 9 hours ago
Hard to imagine that could have been the case given that he was Nvidia's CEO from the very beginning.
vidarh | 9 hours ago
lkbm | 9 hours ago
But that doesn't preclude there being a lot of competent talent on the second rung. (I think 60 people reported directly to him.)
dpz | 9 hours ago
dofm | 9 hours ago
But my guess is, he'd rather resign on this note than what will come out in a few weeks.
teknologist | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 9 hours ago
creatonez | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 9 hours ago
randallsquared | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 8 hours ago
embedding-shape | 9 hours ago
teknologist | 6 hours ago
dofm | 2 hours ago
teknologist | 2 hours ago
dofm | 2 hours ago
I think you don't understand that this creates _enormous_ legal liability for Nvidia. It's straightforwardly bad news and people get fired for it.
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
dofm | 26 minutes ago
Whether or not you're arguing that Nvidia should just say, well, the worst his shagging around is going to cost us is X billion, price it in and let it slide, as so many seem to be, I can't give you a number.
But ethics, the law, it actually does matter.
smallerize | 9 hours ago
And if you don't know why leaders can't have relationships with their employees, that ignorance is on you. You're trying to insult other people but it just makes you look bad.
Der_Einzige | 8 hours ago
She'd be stupid as hell to divorce him.
dofm | 8 hours ago
lnsru | 6 hours ago
dofm | 4 hours ago
Edit: and there it is. Two employees, not just one.
teknologist | 6 hours ago
Besides that, it comes down to how well he's able to separate personal life and work, and whether he continues to add value for shareholders (which Nvidia has clearly been an absolute outlier at doing, during his tenure).
But it looks like they won't give him a chance anyway.
smallerize | 5 hours ago
watwut | 9 hours ago
I mean realistically, no it would not. They do not resign for that in general. It is tall order for them to resign or leave when there is credible or proven accusation of actual abuse or harassment, there is not even that in play.
dofm | 8 hours ago
McDonald's, Intel, CNN, NBC, CBS, Astronomer, Best Buy, Nestlé, Kohl's, Comtech, BP, CBOE, Barclay's.
Not hard to find examples from the last ten years.
watwut | 8 hours ago
> At CNN, Mr Zucker faced criticism from those who believed the network gave too much coverage to the former president, especially during the Republican presidential primary. Mr Trump has also criticised what he saw as unfair coverage.
I will happily argue that affair was just an excuse for other reasons. His coverage was not pro-Trump enough.
dofm | 2 hours ago
Well you could, but considering:
1) Zucker's "too much coverage" that was internally complained about was him trying to be pro-Trump, not anti- (regardless of what the then-still-disgraced former President whined about)
2) his resignation came in 2022 while CNN was still largely free of the right-wing pressure campaign it has been under in the last 18 months pre-merger
3) … in the middle of an internal sex scandal investigation involving someone else, in the #MeToo era, when the company was trying to make it very clear that it would not tolerate such things
I think it would be quite a stretch to make your case.
Jeff Zucker was not even fired for the relationship, but for failing to tell the board about it as company rules said he must.
Again: top CEOs do indeed resign over this stuff. Because it is serious: it opens them up to blackmail and opens the company up to lawsuits.
watwut | an hour ago
2.) It was not free of that pressure, it was just not that super high yet.
My case is that sex alone wont make it. It is easy to make my case, you are kind making it for me by adding more reasons why it was not just afair on itself.
dofm | an hour ago
> I said "not pro-Trump enough". I did not said "anti Trump".
He was not ousted from CNN for not being pro-Trump enough. If anyone at CNN ousted him for politics-related reasons, it would have been because he was too pro-Trump. Because he was, for example, helping Trump before the election debates, offering to have a weekly show with him etc. This pissed off a lot of his colleagues.
None of that is why he was fired (because it would have happened sooner).
He was fired because he broke corporate rules in a way that embarrassed them when they were trying to boot out Chris Cuomo for being a genuine abusive boss.
That is the reason, end of story.
frogblast | 9 hours ago
Then it was a negotiation about how.
Sometimes people can see the writing on the wall and choose to not burn down their life’s work on the way out.
koolba | 9 hours ago
That’s also why more recent tech companies got rid of that pesky independent board by having total voting control.
FireBeyond | 9 hours ago
bbor | 9 hours ago
aleph_minus_one | 9 hours ago
So, it would not be a dumb idea for Jensen Huang to leave scorched earth and "let the world burn" (and in particular cause utter panic in the AI sector). :-)
paxy | 9 hours ago
silverFork | 9 hours ago
Don't worry about him.
teknologist | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 9 hours ago
thibsrn | 9 hours ago
ghc | 9 hours ago
gizajob | 9 hours ago
Apocryphon | 4 hours ago
modzu | 9 hours ago
logicchains | 6 hours ago
gotmedium | 9 hours ago
modzu | 9 hours ago
avajon | 9 hours ago
TechSquidTV | 9 hours ago
igleria | 9 hours ago
ucyo | 9 hours ago
andreshb | 9 hours ago
throwayay58373 | 9 hours ago
fuussssip | 9 hours ago
bekman | 9 hours ago
mihaaly | 9 hours ago
yokoprime | 9 hours ago
WarmWash | 9 hours ago
Maybe the veneer isn't there, but it's very hard to make the case that Apple has in any way failed following the loss of him. Cook was pretty mediocre, and it shows that when you have a strong ship sailing, you just need a "not total idiot" to keep it going.
linuxftw | 8 hours ago
WarmWash | 8 hours ago
linuxftw | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
Apple was saved because it abandoned all its pre-1997 software and adopted NEXTSTEP, which Jobs created.
linuxftw | 4 hours ago
linguae | 8 hours ago
I'm also reminded about the state of HP once the founders retired. My understanding is that John Young and Lewis Platt preserved the HP Way. However, Platt's successor, Carly Fiorina, moved the company far away from the HP Way, and HP hasn't been the same since.
This is a sad time for NVIDIA. I hope NVIDIA is blessed to get a Platt and not a Fiorina.
lavp | 8 hours ago
saturn8601 | 6 hours ago
If someone else that wasn't directly trained by Jobs for years was hired, i'd argue that the culture would start to falter because one thing slides somewhere, then another, then another an soon enough 'A players' don't want to sacrifice their core years at a company that isn't instilling the values they want to work under. Cook himself almost went down that path with his budding career at Compaq. His family thought he was nuts to leave the growing company for Apple of all places. They didn't see the values that Cook saw in Jobs.
WarmWash | 5 hours ago
I don't think that Nvidias board will have any problem though finding an A tier CEO to run the company.
They probably will not get an S-tier visionary, but mature companies with deeply established roots don't necessarily need that like nascent companies do.
hebleb | 8 hours ago
Zigurd | 7 hours ago
nonethewiser | 6 hours ago
dangoodmanUT | 9 hours ago
The king’s crown tumbles. Stock is already down 10% this morning.
I wonder if this will be the catalyst for Nvidia losing the lead
verdverm | 8 hours ago
dewwi | 9 hours ago
sigbottle | 9 hours ago
dewwi | 8 hours ago
Makes you wonder what would happen if the US ever wanted to enforce "certified US AI" on its chips
vrmiguel | 7 hours ago
Nvidia can certainly put up some guardrails that will sound impressive to the dinosaurs in Congress, but can it really stop China from using those GPUs anyway?
This is a simplification, but is this not in some way similar to how the Switch 1 has hacked due to a design flaw on Nvidia's Tegra chip?
In the same way, even if their GPUs get this protection, wouldn't a state actor figure out how to get around it?
aseipp | 4 hours ago
Most of the hardware functionality from a GPU that models need is generic and used every time you use a GPU for any compute. You can implement language models in a GLSL shader; modern GPUs have been programmable for 20 years, that's the point of their existence. The best thing they could do is just literally nerf the consumer hardware substantially to make tokens unusable or stop selling consumer hardware. They don't need spyware to do that. It would also make their products dogshit.
More broadly, "Compute" is basically a resource that our economy relies on to a large degree, it has been that way for decades. And it turns out it's very bad when you just destroy the thing your economy relies on. And doing so doesn't solve problems like "Current computers exist today" or "Other people make computers". So who gives a shit about Jensen? Comments here talking about "taking him out"? What's actually more likely is just that really powerful people today are often corrupt and also really fucking stupid. He played a stupid game and lost.
None of this stuff is putting the current open weights genie back in the bottle IMO. Amodei using RoboStormtrooperGruppen9000 bots and going door to door to take peoples GPUs at gunpoint is a more plausible method of doing so.
msdz | 18 minutes ago
Open-weight models, at an absolute minimum the ones that already exist, are here to stay, and will continue ([0]) to get drastically cheaper to run.
[0] I shall continue to reference one my favorite articles in recent months: https://jyn.dev/tokens-too-cheap-to-meter/
rescbr | 9 hours ago
bigbaguette | 8 hours ago
Either through technical means, or simpler: by law for American providers. It's hard to believe the administration was not aware of Jensen's affiliations all this time. And time is pressing for Anthropic and OpenAI.
Only conjectures for now, time will tell
wernam | 8 hours ago
wavemode | 8 hours ago
lol had to read this several times due to all the negatives
finally got it - "I hope NVIDIA continue to allow inference..."
therealfigtree | 7 hours ago
midtake | an hour ago
wavemode | 11 minutes ago
nullbio | 6 hours ago
xiphias2 | 2 hours ago
It's sad that people talk here about some personal affairs when it's clearly about governmental control, but it's not the first time a scandal is used as a weapon.
hintymad | an hour ago
For real? Anthropic sounds more evil that my wildest imagination. If true, I hope this kind of evil company gets destroyed sooner than later.
mihaaly | 9 hours ago
yanhangyhy | 9 hours ago
snapcaster | 2 hours ago
thomasjeff1 | 9 hours ago
catchnear4321 | 9 hours ago
It’s really not hard.
pbkompasz | 9 hours ago
googaar | 9 hours ago
Extramarital affairs are pretty common in our ruling class, so unless the media is conveniently withholding information, think he got in bed with the wrong folks.
isoprophlex | 9 hours ago
DonHopkins | 9 hours ago
One Blue Tsunami, and now all the oligarchs are suddenly turning progressive and transitioning! Trump was right all along. This is exactly what he was trying to warn us about.
Think of all the mistresses who will now have to accept and adapt to their oligarch lover's new gender -- Jensen has at least two that we know of, but when you see two ants in the kitchen, you know there are a lot more. I can't wait to see the wig Bezos picks out.
Sol- | 9 hours ago
I assume leaning on Nvidia to integrate chip verification and tracking to not let any unmonitored compute exist in the world is next, which is also in line with what the leading US labs want.
the_duke | 8 hours ago
soundworlds | 8 hours ago
cryptonector | 6 hours ago
meowlamoon | 2 hours ago
I don't think the hawk fraction holds actual leverage on any of them to intervene.
I think the situation is just the board gets overwhelmed by journos, panicked, rushed to a decision, and Jensen resigned knowing he has to leave.
ekojs | 9 hours ago
From the NYT live updates.
Ah well, I'm somewhat seeing parallels to the 2023 OpenAI drama, not sure if this is gonna be how things end quite yet.
Aboutplants | 8 hours ago
Tadpole9181 | 6 hours ago
Oh good, a business suit with no engineering experience. Nvidia is doomed.
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
glimshe | 9 hours ago
ceejayoz | 9 hours ago
radicalbyte | 9 hours ago
stetrain | 9 hours ago
ceejayoz | 9 hours ago
What we can prove in the near future likely changed a bit when Congress went to the Dems a few days ago. Republicans weren't gonna make a scene about their $25M donation to the ballroom project.
radicalbyte | 8 hours ago
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/14/us-clears-h200-chip-sales-to...
I need to find the links but the reporting in Europe was that this was part of a deal where Trump got given a 20% fee for it (I believe those were his own words!).
It was reported together with the victim statements of the children Trump allegedly raped. I understand that the US media aren't allowed to publish any of these stories though so I can understand why few people would know about them.
jshier | 9 hours ago
johnnyanmac | 9 hours ago
Not particularly new situation in the recent US times. Far from the last time this will happen.
radicalbyte | 9 hours ago
The French and Italians wouldn't blink an eye. Us Brits, we'd talk about it, he's get a slap on the wrist but wouldn't be sacked.
It seems to be a uniquely American thing that the CEO can basically do anything (lie, cheat, fraud etc) just as long as he doesn't get caught with his pants down.
jordanb | 9 hours ago
Several BP executives resigned in a sex scandal just this year
https://news.sky.com/story/bp-chairman-removed-from-role-aft...
fuussssip | 9 hours ago
These aren't just affairs.
Also, fraud remains to be seen, and shopping chips to China sure seems like questionable judgement.
I think you are too narrowly focused.
deadbabe | 9 hours ago
fishgoesblub | 8 hours ago
wedoctor | 8 hours ago
fuussssip | 4 hours ago
Do you remember how Monica Lewinsky was treated? Decades of jokes at her expense, mockery of her and her features, jokes about dresses and semen and blowjobs. Can you imagine how hard it still must be to deal with all that shit day to day?
Bill Clinton still has enormous power. He's had to face nowhere near the burden she has, and yet he's the one who cheated and he's the one who did so with a report.
radicalbyte | 8 hours ago
These shipments to China - I remember there being a deal made with the President which allowed these sales to happen contingent on some kind of "risk fee" being paid.. to the President.
mcmcmc | 2 hours ago
ikety | 9 hours ago
Now cheating on your wife with a FOREIGN SPY, yea that's a big deal no matter what the country.
mcmcmc | 9 hours ago
Speak for yourself. The sanctity of marriage is pretty important to a lot of Americans. Not everyone lives in a Berkeley polycule.
bsoles | 8 hours ago
mcmcmc | 7 hours ago
ks2048 | 4 hours ago
mcmcmc | 4 hours ago
fernandotakai | 9 hours ago
he resigned because there's some proof that he knew that nvidia was selling cards/chips to china -- the affair only made that extremely public.
Yoric | 8 hours ago
KingOfCoders | 9 hours ago
zulux | 8 hours ago
KingOfCoders | 8 hours ago
bl4ckm0r3 | 9 hours ago
throw9383830 | 9 hours ago
American CEO would get meetoed. Any sort of sex (even consensual) is illegal, if you have no way to prove it! Lets way a few weeks...
root_axis | 9 hours ago
https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulat...
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/06/lululemon-ceo-laurent-potdev...
https://fortune.com/europe/2024/06/11/bp-managers-given-ulti...
gizajob | 9 hours ago
kimixa | 8 hours ago
And also puts doubt on any decisions by the boss that affect the employee - companies don't want people "sleeping their way to the top" as that's not putting the business' needs first.
gizajob | 8 hours ago
Klonoar | 7 hours ago
(Your second statement carries far more weight)
kimixa | 6 hours ago
It's why we generally frown upon relationships if there's any direct business link.
bluGill | 8 hours ago
As an aside, the above applies to any one of any gender sleeping with their boss (again of any gender)
ImJamal | 8 hours ago
gizajob | 8 hours ago
ImJamal | 6 hours ago
gizajob | 5 hours ago
ImJamal | 5 hours ago
root_axis | 8 hours ago
gizajob | 8 hours ago
root_axis | 7 hours ago
What the hell are you talking about? Nobody is saying anything like that. Why are you even bringing culture war garbage into this conversation?
gizajob | 7 hours ago
root_axis | 6 hours ago
You're the one that's flaming by introducing culture war garbage where none is necessary.
> I was responding to the OP’s framing as the women as passive participants in this saga.
I don't know who you think you're talking about, but you responded to my comment, and I didn't say or suggest anything like that.
giwook | 9 hours ago
radicalbyte | 8 hours ago
Narrow-minded? I don't know, given the levels of insanity and in-your-face corruption we've seen pretty much every day coming from the US and particularly from the entire tech ecosystem it's really hard to understand the "norms".
I've read about how the US President raped a young girl (13) and multiple other victim accounts. I've watched how we've shown consequences to Prince Andrew, Mandelson and many others. I also see on Twitter the owners of this very site standing behind the disgusting people on the US.
I can't square that with the Jensen situation.
I should add that I'm personally in the camp of leaders who cheat on their wives or who make or accept bribes should be removed from their position. I don't agree with the British (or French/Italian) takes at all.
kakacik | 8 hours ago
But yeah how can US folks stomach child rapists at the top of their power is beyond me, I've met plenty of folks with flexible spines while working in banking but this is on completely another level and that level is whole nation.
radicalbyte | 5 hours ago
The problem is that a whole layer of society have been completely and utterly corrupted to an extent which makes say a country like India seem to be a paradise.
giwook | an hour ago
giwook | an hour ago
And then you immediately overgeneralize and lump the "whole nation" into accepting a child rapist as president.
...?
bluGill | 9 hours ago
However he will lose is job over an affair with someone that he has any form of business relationship with. He can have an affair with a nurse in the local hospital of the waitress of a local cafe and we will ignore it. However the girls he had an affair with are off-limits, and should be for any culture for reasons that we think should be obvious.
stasomatic | 8 hours ago
Did he do anything besides infidelity, as it seems that the "board" knew about that anyway.
In any case, he fell on his sword, and I wish him well in the afterlife, nothing is black and white.
bluGill | 7 hours ago
stasomatic | 7 hours ago
mcs5280 | 8 hours ago
skullone | 8 hours ago
deepfriedchokes | 7 hours ago
giancarlostoro | 9 hours ago
Who you have an affair with matters more, in this case a Chinese spy wasn't enough, which almost makes you think, he was not the only one at Nvidia who knew.
Glyptodon | 8 hours ago
worldsavior | 9 hours ago
alangibson | 9 hours ago
jmyeet | 9 hours ago
I think the affair with the subordinate was the big problem. That opens up NVidia to a lot of legal exposure.
The Chinese spy is bizarre because these guys have corporate security and cooperation of the US government. How was this allowed to happen?
Skirting export bans is an unknown. I honestly don't believe this administration would let anything bad happen there. Jensen Huang is simply too rich and NVidia too big.
mcmcmc | 9 hours ago
The affair with his subordinate brings this into question. The power dynamic makes consent extremely iffy. There is a reason it is not allowed.
booty | 9 hours ago
Yeah, this is the most interesting part to me.
It points to the US government knowing about this, and holding onto it as compromat until the time was right to kick him out. But I don't even have a guess as to why this was viewed as the right time...
trolleski | 9 hours ago
geonic | 9 hours ago
shaolinspirit | 9 hours ago
ryzvonusef | 9 hours ago
Nah, this is about the indirect Chinese access to chips, and this whole cheating thing is a cover. He's confessing to a 'lesser' crime to save himself for the real threat of jail.
randyrand | 7 hours ago
bad_haircut72 | 9 hours ago
avajon | 9 hours ago
Colette Kress has brain of Marisa Mayer who destroyed Yahoo. A woke clown to lead technology company? No vision, no skills, no understanding of technology.
addisonj | 9 hours ago
I don't want to sound like a Jensen apologist, obviously huge missteps on his part, but he was quite a figure in shaping the last few years broad economic narrative. Good or bad, he was a force in shaping one of the largest investments ever. Does that shift without him? Does it shift really quick?
I would have preferred a slow fade into the sunset as a opposed to a dramatic exit. Yes, there would have always been a correction, but the bubble bursting explosively vs a more measured, slower correction will have different broader impacts and I just hope this doesn't push more towards the outcome that hurts a lot more.
debrisontrack | 9 hours ago
chvid | 9 hours ago
ksec | 9 hours ago
I was under the impression he sold it to a Singapore company, or even any other companies. What those companies do with those GPU is not his fault.
This whole thing is just a sad story.
ZoneZealot | 9 hours ago
The same company they've audited the datacentres of, and saw dummy non-running servers within which had been stripped of their GPUs, and were 'fooled' that they were simply yet to be commissioned.
ksec | 9 hours ago
On 2nd point, even Hyperscalers have large stack of GPU sitting idle yet to be commissioned.
ZoneZealot | 8 hours ago
Yes US hyperscalers have plenty of hardware but are running out of 'warm shells' to put them into. It's not much of a problem in Southeast Asia.
voganmother42 | 9 hours ago
Varelion | 9 hours ago
nickalaso | 9 hours ago
Even if they have to pay a fine or increased regulatory scrutiny. At this point NVIDIA is more like SHELL(10 years ago maybe/during oil spill scandal) than a tech company. Its going to keep printing money with its chips.
So, I guess I'll timestamp my prediction that now is a good time to buy NVIDIA stock.
frogblast | 9 hours ago
How much of Nvidia’s revenue came from infringing sales to china? If so, that revenue is probably going to disappear as now they will have to really be serious about export controls or face much greater pain. Some estimates I’ve seen is 30% of their revenue perhaps disappearing overnight!
thatsabadlook | 9 hours ago
sarchertech | 9 hours ago
nickalaso | 9 hours ago
And I'm pretty sure any CEO with at least a bachelors degree knows about the De beers diamonds story, so, I really find it hard to believe they will struggle with the concept of maintaining their artifical scarcity/demand.
RobKohr | 8 hours ago
giladd | 8 hours ago
LogicFailsMe | 9 hours ago
intrasight | 9 hours ago
barrenko | 9 hours ago
Plus whole lot of people waiting for that signal that the "AI bubble " is about to burst. No bubble will be bursting as a cause of this.
nickalaso | 6 hours ago
We have a new equivalent to something like Web 2.0 boom, Its not like the dot com bubble, because its not actually made up of a lot of empty unimplemented websites with too few users.
Rather its already able and in my opinion has met Dario's claim about 'replacing all developer jobs' if a bit later than he claimed, alongside every other single job, nearly bar none, able to be replaced if it can be done via a computer.
For example, Fable 5.2. I wish it was cheaper. It's able to perform a build out of and then run an entire complex software stack, including dependencies/servers for internal opensource git servers with ci/cd and the full git and jira featureset combined, with spin up/server management across every major cloud provider and then use said stack to run a swarm as a collaborating dev team from every major llm provider.
I know that because I've done most of it (or rather Fable has). I started this project 24 hours ago. I now have:
Complete containerized customized claude code + codex deployment package with tacked on feature set 'plugin' mostly for claude + a custom-agent mcp that drives mostly codex for now, allowing claude to call codex subagents (so I can farm that subscription too), that allows multi level sub-orchs which make sub agents via said mcp with future work items being bringing in a modified hermes or pi harness to use across the board (Claude code stays until I can afford 20k usd monthly api usage).
This also includes a custom ci/cd deployment set of pipelines/management to aws servers easily integrated with necessary accounts, which was done adhoc as a replacement for gh actions, because of course I've used all 18 usd of my free usage on my private account, and then all 18 usd of my free usage on the git enterprise trial about 14 hours ago.
This is alongside getting ready to finally ship to prod several high complexity SaaS including international supplier integration, and a 'contact suppliers' module/role for high tier llm models only and an entire suite of CAD design and 3d model design with an array of custom tools for both.... which is now good enough that its actually production ready for my niche market. And I'm not even bullshitting. Its a good thing somebody on my team speaks mandarin and it isn't me. So far its been fine surprisingly.
Anyways apologies for the ramble, I need some sleep.
Its just so bewildering to me though. All that gobbledygook I just typed out is actually true, and I've tested the hell out of it, myself, I've had my wife test it, etc. It actually works. I can't think of anything I would need a technical employee even for now at this point. Because every bug I find I tell a fable session to make a git issue for and fix and then it does that and the bug is actually gone...
Now its more just the gatekeeping/relationship building hand shaking part that seems to need people still. I was thinking about a marketing lead but then I dipped Fables toes into that too...
I guess the AI vibe code everything bros that were infuriating 12 months ago, had the right mentality.
rib3ye | 9 hours ago
revengerwizard | 9 hours ago
nickalaso | 9 hours ago
Personally I think a bigger risk than that is AI models getting good enough to legitimately just reverse engineer and open source CUDA directly.
jasode | 8 hours ago
The key is that NVIDIA is in a fast-changing technology sector and that means the core business requires NVIDIA to keep innovating new and better products that beat the competition. Having a company continuously adapt and iterate future products requires a visionary leader that pushes the company to stay on the cutting edge. Competitors and alternative products like Google TPU, Amazon Trainium, AMD, Cerebrus, etc are not standing still; they're innovating too.
Many shareholders (including employees with RSU stock) are worried that NVIDIA without Jensen puts them in a weaker position for the future unless they can find someone with equivalent influence and vision.
Intel was once on top of the world with CEO Andy Grove running things. But then the followup CEOs didn't keep Intel at the cutting edge and they lost market leadership to TSMC, AMD, and Apple Silicon in various areas. The world kept changing and Intel didn't adapt fast enough.
sobellian | 8 hours ago
nkassis | 8 hours ago
Everyone is somewhat replaceable but the work they historically have done might have been critical to reach current stage. And Nvidia may miss on what he could have done but it will take a while for the downturn to happen and others are just as capable. They may find another internal or external candidate that may be able to push further. Market will price the uncertainty until then.
nickalaso | 6 hours ago
Its more of a 'race to the bottom' for price efficiency/hardware deg efficiency against price of electricity and price of the chips over lifetime, than it is a fast changing tech sector where breakthroughs are being made everyday that change the entire game like say with OpenAI and Anthropic.
So basically like a blue chip.
techblueberry | 8 hours ago
And it was all high risk. It may be only a once in a generation founder who wants to orchestrate that risk.
And again, no one was expecting NVIDIA to stay flat, massive growth was priced in.
prewett | 8 hours ago
I would say it’s under-priced, but I get really nervous when my thinking diverges this strongly from the market. Previous confidence in my thinking has not gone well.
nickalaso | 9 hours ago
So, I guess I'll timestamp my prediction that now is a good time to buy NVIDIA stock.
newAccount2025 | 9 hours ago
JoJacobs7676 | 9 hours ago
modzu | 9 hours ago
syngrog66 | 9 hours ago
yangm97 | 7 hours ago
sys_64738 | 9 hours ago
kittikitti | 9 hours ago
ajdecon | 8 hours ago
thwgrw | 9 hours ago
ddxv | 9 hours ago
Now without him there will be a vacuum for the ideologies of Dario / Elon / Sam to fill the void.
rapsey | 9 hours ago
nozzlegear | 8 hours ago
kingleopold | 7 hours ago
whatevaa | 7 hours ago
kingleopold | 7 hours ago
recursive | 6 hours ago
guitarlimeo | 5 hours ago
malfist | an hour ago
drewbeck | 2 hours ago
CrimsonRain | 7 hours ago
nonethewiser | 6 hours ago
nozzlegear | 4 hours ago
__rito__ | 6 hours ago
avidruntime | 6 hours ago
__rito__ | 5 hours ago
not_wyoming | 4 hours ago
Andrex | 6 hours ago
He fucked a communist spy and he admitted he did it.
Not only that, everyone in his orbit was running interference for months before that on a DIFFERENT affair with a subordinate[0]. Why was everyone covering for him if there really was some conspiracy to "railroad" him? Or maybe Sam Altman's coordinating with China to honeypot CEOs because reasons?
0. https://www.axios.com/2026/11/11/nvidia-jensen-huang-affair-...
__rito__ | 5 hours ago
I am saying it here:
> Jensen having an alleged affair makes it easier for them, and that's it.
nemothekid | 5 hours ago
The communist spy is the invented reason. There has been zero evidence presented that Alice Huang is a spy for the CCP[1], and if they did have evidence it would have been more appropriate to charge Jenson last year when the Trump administration was made aware of the relationship.
Everything about Alice being a honeypot has largely been hearsay.
To me, it's far more likely that someone in the state department did not like that Jenson was circumventing export controls and manufactured this to bury him.
[1]https://www.politico.com/news/2026/11/11/jim-himes-alice-hua...
Thrombocius | 5 hours ago
“Show me the man, and I will show you the crime”
I don’t think he was even making the case that his rivals were involved in this, only that if they really wanted him gone for advocating for open source models, it’s not like they needed this specific scandal to pull it off.
nozzlegear | 5 hours ago
sfink | 3 hours ago
swat535 | 5 hours ago
There would be another smear campaign, sexual assault allegation or shady dealings.
It's easy to find dirt on everyone and coordinate the media to take them down. He had to go because of geopolitics due to US/China relations and the AI race.
It has nothing with his "dick", that's just a story they sold to public.
nozzlegear | 5 hours ago
Why? By all accounts everyone in the US loved him and thought he was the "le face of AI" or whatever. Would he have been ensnared in this scheme to smuggle chips to China if he hadn't slept with a Chinese spy who just happened to be a top exec at Megaspeed? If he didn't have this proclivity for affairs in the first place? The world may never know, but it can speculate.
BoorishBears | an hour ago
If it does turn out that Jack Clark (Anthropic cofounder) was a major source behind this, the timing starts to get a bit suspect
ThrowawayTestr | 4 hours ago
DaSHacka | 8 hours ago
OrangeDelonge | 4 hours ago
sfink | 3 hours ago
pembrook | 2 hours ago
And that as a byproduct we profit by not living under an Anthropic quasi-religious doom cult monopoly, with open access to competing models?
It's almost as if the competing self-interest that drives the invisible hand of the market is a positive force for value creation in the world.
hackmack10 | 5 hours ago
xyst | 4 hours ago
CGMthrowaway | an hour ago
AndrewKemendo | an hour ago
NiloCK | 54 minutes ago
I've consistently seen Jensen as a transparently self-interested shovel salesman while we dig our own mass grave.
For a person in his position, he has been exceedingly slow to wake up to the prospect of AGI - he seemed genuinely surprised by arguments from informed layperson Ezra Klein, for example, like he'd never even heard of it before.
mahboi | 51 minutes ago
twodave | 9 hours ago
timmg | 9 hours ago
I had only heard about a consensual relationship.
paxy | 9 hours ago
caminante | 9 hours ago
[0] https://www.woodsrogers.com/insights/publications/this-valen...
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
Do you have stats on how common these are? Is it more popular in some non US country maybe?
caminante | 8 hours ago
Good idea about stats. Please share what you find.
komali2 | 9 hours ago
caminante | 8 hours ago
1. The subordinate story broke yesterday. The stock dropped 12% (not 20) and recovered half.
2. But for the spy/export control subversion, do you think a CEO would be stepping down for banging a co-worker? LOL...
wasfgwp | 9 hours ago
paxy | 9 hours ago
throwaway6977 | 9 hours ago
Jtarii | 8 hours ago
wasfgwp | 8 hours ago
paxy | 8 hours ago
wasfgwp | 8 hours ago
*that we know of
wasfgwp | 8 hours ago
Obviously it depends from case to case and there are certain lines that shouldn’t be crossed but otherwise consenting adults should be free to make their own decisions.
vouwfietsman | 4 hours ago
moralestapia | 8 hours ago
* My age, +/- 2 years.
* Comparable emotional and intellectual development.
* Same level of education.
* Earn within 10% of what I earn.
* Total net worth within 10% of mine.
* Muscular, so we're of comparable strength.
* Exact same cultural and ethnic background.
* No chronic diseases or disabilities, since I don't have any and that would be an unfair advantage.
* Read Hacker News just as pathologically frequently, so we both know when to short NVIDIA at approximately the same time.
twodave | 8 hours ago
_ph_ | 8 hours ago
unethical_ban | an hour ago
These restrictions exist in most workplaces. Boss/subordinate relationships can result in extortion and bad behavior, regardless of which party starts it.
Janicc | 9 hours ago
stronglikedan | 9 hours ago
When did they discover the quid-pro-quo aspect of this particular relationship? The news is moving so fast that I must have missed that part.
mohamedkoubaa | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
isquaredr | 2 hours ago
hbn | 8 hours ago
You could just as easily say she did sexual favors to get a leg-up over more qualified peers and get/maintain her position.
If anything, the fact he got fired seems to imply she has all the power in their relationship being outed. I haven't seen anyone calling for her head.
caminante | 9 hours ago
Parent is oblivious to this and has already made up their mind that these policies don't exist
> The fact the he did it, and that she got promoted seals his fate as a predator in my mind.
threetonesun | 9 hours ago
caminante | 8 hours ago
These policies are intentionally narrowed to workplace conflicts of interest. HR doesn't want to manage morality clauses or stuff outside the workplace.
Insanity | 8 hours ago
Anyway, not sure if that's the case here but it's hard to rule out entirely.
modzu | 5 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
caminante | 8 hours ago
> Even if it's consensual, what happens when she decides she wants to move on from the relationship?
Then they're no longer in a relationship and still have to follow HR/company policies.
>What about her peers that didn't receive promotions while she did?
Did they follow the company policy (e.g., hiring committee recusal) or not for the promotions?
>This is why these laws exist.
Did the company policies follow employment regulations when setting and enforcing their policy?
twodave | 7 hours ago
caminante | 3 hours ago
I see your opinion. In MY opinion, this wouldn't be an issue but for the spy scandal. Now, anything that comes up (complying or not complying with policy) triggers more urgency by shareholders and the board to make change. They don't care about HR due process.
twodave | 2 hours ago
timmg | 7 hours ago
rozal | 4 hours ago
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
arecsu | 9 hours ago
saisundar | 8 hours ago
vehemenz | 2 hours ago
wewewedxfgdf | 3 hours ago
Jackson__ | 9 hours ago
cataphract | 9 hours ago
To be fair though, a CEO having an affair with a subordinate should be seen with at least some suspicion...
SV_BubbleTime | 8 hours ago
The people saying you can’t trust women… are mostly coming from women.
Wild time if you are dating! Yes could mean No if later she decides she didn’t like something about it.
twodave | 8 hours ago
igleria | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
bad_haircut72 | 9 hours ago
BeetleB | 9 hours ago
When I entered the workforce not so long ago most companies didn't even have policies against it. My university didn't make a policy about it until 2012. I know a very happily married couple who got married this way (a little earlier - perhaps around 2006 or 2007). I don't think they'd be happy if I referred to their behavior as "sexual harrasment".
I think it's a good policy and it's fair they enforce it, but equating it to sexual harassment is nonsense.
yodsanklai | 9 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
BeetleB | 7 hours ago
BeetleB | 7 hours ago
Extremely rare (winning such a lawsuit). Prior to these kinds of rules becoming the norm, how often did anyone win such a lawsuit? It's a rounding error close to 0.
There are plenty of publicized cases where one party openly stated she got promotions because of her affair with a senior. No lawsuits were even filed in the ones I know.
I'm in favor of such rules precisely because it's hard to win such a suit.
netrap | 9 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
Alpi | 8 hours ago
What is known now is described a conflict of interest (which is bad already for a CEO). Whether it was a harassment - investigation should show.
kridsdale1 | 7 hours ago
falsemyrmidon | 7 hours ago
jmyeet | 9 hours ago
Consider the case of Regina Santos-Aviles [1]. She committed suicide by setting herself on fire and had revealed that she'd been having an affair with her boss.
The power dynamics here are insane. Huang was the CEO and a billionaire. The legal liability that NVidia has or could have because of this is huge, particularly if they did nothing. Now there are big questions about who knew what when.
The reporting says somebody say them in a San Jose hotel and was basically hushed with an NDA, and probably a big payment (I'm guessing; I don't know). Was that from NVidia or Huang personally? What NVidia staff, if any, authorized that?
If the board wants to really clean house they should authorize a thorough external investigation of that and any other possible affairs.
[1]: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tony-gonzales-aide-affair-texts...
enronmusk | 9 hours ago
If you truly believe this, you're living in a bubble. Economically it might be pro free markets, but socially it's heavily "progressive" -- see any discussions about Omarchy, LGBTQ, Elon, or Trump.
SV_BubbleTime | 9 hours ago
I think media, social and traditional, has really done a number on people’s perspectives. I’m not sure why ideology replaces self-awareness.
orblivion | 8 hours ago
jmyeet | 6 hours ago
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50164265
SV_BubbleTime | 5 hours ago
DanTheManPR | 8 hours ago
JohnnyMarcone | 7 hours ago
jmyeet | 7 hours ago
Politics is about economics. All of the so-called "culture war" issues (eg LGBT rights, bodily autonomy, etc) don't make you left wing if you are still an avowed capitalist. The success of the Republican Party hinges on the success they've had in propagandizing culture war issues to avoid talking about economics. And the establishment Democrat Party is complicit because they have the exact same paymasters.
On this issue you see a ton of people in the comments saying "yeah but Jensen made so much money" as a reason why he shouldn't suffer the consequences. If making money has primacy in your decision making well... you're right wing, definitionally.
As other commenters have noted, every time Elon comes up there are a ton of HN defenders, despite him being a complete fascist (in technical terms, not a pejorative) and doing the Nazi salute on national TV (twice).
> Economically it might be pro free markets, ...
Well, first there's no such thing as "free markets". Second, you're basically saying "capitalism". As I said, right wing.
wasfgwp | 9 hours ago
That means he can’t have any affairs with anyone who isn’t a billionaire without it turning into sexual harassment due to the imbalance in power?
> basically hushed with an NDA, and probably a big payment
So depending on how big the payment the alleged victim might be pretty happy with the outcome?
I mean if the board believes that the actions of the CEO resulted in financial damage to the company it’s up to them to investigate and deal with it. I just don’t get the whole morality police angle as long as the affair was between consenting rational adults.
orblivion | 9 hours ago
I've found HN to be pretty hostile to DOGE (whereas conversation is usually respectful even for fringe viewpoints; something special happened here).
jghn | 8 hours ago
To spin it another way: if we ignore the rise of the faux-libertarian (you know, the more typical brand now, libertarian but all for a strong military and christian nationalism), I'd argue that the typical HN skews more old school small-l libertarian on the right wing spectrum. That's quite a bit different from the MAGA, christian nationalist, style of right wing politics that has been in vogue lately.
orblivion | 8 hours ago
jghn | 8 hours ago
orblivion | 6 hours ago
nemomarx | 8 hours ago
I don't think you can assume much just by knowing somebody disliked them.
SV_BubbleTime | 8 hours ago
nemomarx | 8 hours ago
orblivion | 8 hours ago
dyauspitr | 9 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
dyauspitr | 5 hours ago
jatora | 9 hours ago
The irony is so sweet here.
mliker | 9 hours ago
SV_BubbleTime | 8 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
sergiotapia | 9 hours ago
"Subordinate", get a grip!
al_borland | 9 hours ago
twodave | 8 hours ago
mrguyorama | 6 hours ago
What's very "Cut and Dry" is that so many of you are very obviously not paying attention to the yearly training, which isn't exactly complicated or difficult material.
lavendermon | 9 hours ago
Misbehavior without consequences seems to have become more noticeable in politics within the past ten years, with mainstream news outlets reporting on insider trading and potential bribes for favors. This ethos of power over accountability seems to be having a trickle down effect on general sentiment.
cubefox | 8 hours ago
It's mindboggling that you describe an apparently completely consensual affair as "sexual harassment". That's absurd.
twodave | 8 hours ago
cubefox | 8 hours ago
Also, I don't think there was an "extreme power imbalance". If anything, she had far more power over him than the other way around, since he had much more to lose and she could blackmail him with making the affair public or other allegations.
twodave | 8 hours ago
cubefox | 7 hours ago
twodave | 7 hours ago
cubefox | 7 hours ago
lavp | 8 hours ago
Musk has done worse, yet nothing has really happened to him.
twodave | 8 hours ago
compsciphd | 8 hours ago
At the end of the day, I wouldn't bash everyone here too strongly when everyone who lined up early behind Hillary basically acted in the same way. (And yes, even though Bill did the act, Hillary lined up easily to defend him, much like the people you mention here)
JohnnyMarcone | 7 hours ago
People in these threads are pretending that 75% of the story doesn't exist and it's just about an affair... insane.
EDIT: Is this just X infecting HN? I don't go on X so I don't know what it's like.
emp17344 | 7 hours ago
doublerabbit | 6 hours ago
This one tip gets you off the hook of any company slander; just release a LLM model.
mrguyorama | 6 hours ago
The Demographics of HN are coming very sharply into focus the past few weeks, and it's awful.
It does sort of explain a lot though.
A shocking amount of these comments are very loudly ignorant of basic concepts of consent, and some seem to be rather proud of it.
mike_bob | 6 hours ago
xquce | 7 hours ago
swingboy | 3 hours ago
iammrpayments | 4 hours ago
twodave | 2 hours ago
hector_vasquez | 4 hours ago
foobiekr | 2 hours ago
Famously, Mark Hurd was fired for this, but immediately hired by Larry Ellison at Oracle because he didn;t give a shit.
tracerbulletx | 2 hours ago
thwgrw | 9 hours ago
mapcars | 9 hours ago
radu_floricica | 7 hours ago
But yeah, the "model" memes are completely offtopic. She's nearly 50.
kphorn | 9 hours ago
I think the real risk for the economy, the AI industry, and the US is that Nvidia becomes JUST another company. Nvidia losing 50% of its value from its peak means it’s still a $3 trillion company. What if it loses 90%? Then it’s the size of Intel which we generally agree is an important part of the industry.
Nvidia can afford to invest in companies because the stock is so high and capital is incredibly abundant. Those companies buy Nvidia products at the 50% NET margins. Nvidia gets a ton of cash. Earnings are crazy. But if this cycle stops and efficiency wins in the market (lower margins, more competitors, more options), then Nvidia goes back to where they were which was a Tier-1/2 supplier battling for margin and market share. That is not a $6T company.
nemomarx | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
ihsw | 9 hours ago
This whole saga has been a ridiculous waste of everybody's time and energy. There's no compelling argument that points to these new innovations not otherwise happening if RAM prices weren't artificially inflated by the fever dream of private equity.
kphorn | 8 hours ago
goodmythical | 7 hours ago
The demand for high-ram consumption applications is higher than ever and rising. That demand is not created by nvidia, but nvidia's customers. nvidia's customers are buying nvidia parts built with other's ram because they have customers renting the compute.
Whoever nvidia is buying ram from will simply sell to the next highest bidder, and the ram will still be sold out through the coming years.
zanderwohl | 6 hours ago
anon7725 | 6 hours ago
If the good Lord's willing and the creek don't rise.
keybrd-intrrpt | 3 hours ago
Contrary to the AI-bubble-doomsayers - most hyperscalers and neoclouds seem to be at capacity for current demand and even have already booked future demand.
parineum | 6 hours ago
RAM prices are a result of skyrocketing demand. That's hardly a fever dream.
You can hardly blame RAM suppliers for taking the money of people who are coming to them begging to pay more than the person before them in line. It's not like they are squeezing the market in some cartel price-fixing racket.It's the customers who are willing trying to pay more for better access. The innovations and the price of RAM are so non-sequitur at this point; I can't understand what point you're making. Sure, if RAM were as easy to get as the circuit boards they're being put on, innovation would be the same (or accelerated!) but that doesn't have anything to do with the fact that RAM is incredibly supply constrained and ramping production to meet the demand of a seemingly insatiable market takes a long time for a product this complicated and specialized.
If any of the manufacturing companies could have seen this coming, they'd have started ramping production to insane levels 5 years ago, and they'd be taking in just as much money as Nvidia is.
throw-qqqqq | 3 hours ago
You don’t know this with certainty, do you?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DRAM_industry_price_fixing
brookst | 59 minutes ago
Besides, when demand outstrips supply you don't have to fix prices. Why would you? They cannot deliver all of the RAM people want. Think about it for a minute: how would price fixing even work?
(and don't get me started on the ridiculous "they're switching from DDR3 to HBM" part of that wikipedia article...)
quickthrowman | 23 minutes ago
Companies (CRWV, etc) are borrowing at 10%+ interest rates to buy NVidia GPUs that NVidia makes 75% gross margin on. I repeat, companies are selling junk bonds to buy GPUs at a 300% markup. Cocaine dealers probably don’t even make 75% gross margins.
Other companies (OpenAI, etc) are also borrowing at 10%+ interest to rent the GPUs to train LLMs.
All of these GPUs need a ton of RAM. There is a fixed supply of RAM. There is insane demand for RAM.
hatethehate | 4 hours ago
TheGamerUncle | 4 hours ago
https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/articles/ram-crisis-one...
"The lawsuit also points towards similar collusion between the companies in the past. In 2005, SK Hynix and Samsung were fined $180 million and $300 million respectively after pleading guilty to price-fixing DRAM pricing. It is suggested that the same occurred between 2016 and 2018 when prices spiked again, ..."
pizzathyme | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
tsunamifury | 8 hours ago
jimbokun | an hour ago
tsunamifury | 41 minutes ago
pembrook | 8 hours ago
Harming Nvidia would only make us more compute constrained, and raise prices further.
It seems it's impossible to get a certain type of person to understand this regardless of whether it's housing, education or chips.
Harming the producers of [thing] or disincentivizing profits will not make [thing] cheaper if demand remains the same (or if it is growing, like in all of the areas I mentioned).
nozzlegear | 8 hours ago
What type of person are you referring to?
randbyte | 6 hours ago
ilovecake1984 | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
qsymmachus | 9 hours ago
loceng | 9 hours ago
Huang has served as CEO for a whopping 33 years - hard to argue he wasn't crucial to NVIDIA's success, and how many of the board members are the original from when he was first chosen-selected and continued to be hired as CEO over the crucial early decades?
What nuanced knowledge-understanding does he have that no one else can have?
Maybe sleeping with spies was a necessary part of survival, perhaps if he wasn't prone to that then he'd have been assassinated and potential replacement CEOs who are toeing certain lines may have been attempted to replace him after his murder?
qsymmachus | 9 hours ago
Respectfully, I don't engage with conspiracy theorists
nozzlegear | 8 hours ago
This is, frankly, an outlandish statement.
loceng | 23 minutes ago
anon291 | 8 hours ago
loceng | 5 hours ago
RIMR | 5 hours ago
saidnooneever | an hour ago
loceng | 16 minutes ago
wat10000 | 8 hours ago
> Behaves like a fool, risks national security to get his dick wet, has unethical affair with subordinate.
> The problem is that people like this get held accountable for their misdeeds instead of being left to do what they want!
anon7725 | 6 hours ago
al_borland | 9 hours ago
lavp | 8 hours ago
psp99 | 7 hours ago
jimbokun | 59 minutes ago
bdelmas | 8 hours ago
IncreasePosts | 7 hours ago
m4rtink | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
dabinat | 37 minutes ago
itishappy | 6 hours ago
charlieyu1 | 6 hours ago
itishappy | 5 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
itishappy | 5 hours ago
RIMR | 5 hours ago
sailfast | 4 hours ago
jimbokun | an hour ago
nobody_r_knows | 6 hours ago
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
asdff | 4 hours ago
No. They have the same 24 hour day as you and I. They think at the same speed and talk at the same speed. Their "workload" whatever it may be, is finite, evidently finite enough to juggle several romatic relationships at the same time, with much actual work and decisionmaking delegated and informed by domain experts who will be there no matter the CEO.
So yes, you or I could in fact be CEO of NVIDIA. It would be easy. Reports would be made for us by the worlds experts in the fields on what is going on. Departments would be ran by the best available talent on earth. My emails are being read and written by a dozen plus secretaries. Every presser I make I have an ivy league grad writing me the speech making me look like Hemingway out there. Every decision I'd make informed by a team of experts. Every plan thought of already by a hundred people smarter than me. All we'd have to do in the role as NVIDIA CEO is smile, waive, and read the lines handed to us on the sheet of paper by someone else. The ship runs itself even though we all pretend it's the CEO paddling 24/7 making it possible.
Really, that's all any of these guys are doing. Very similar to say the job of a pop star. Are you charismatic? Can you read lines? You'd make a great CEO then.
retwakm4 | 3 hours ago
mrandish | 6 hours ago
"We" don't. Media narratives over-focus on individuals and personalities because that's what humans focus on.
Markets can overreact emotionally on daily headlines and weekly narratives but tend to correct quarter to quarter. There's lots of data and examples: Apple after Jobs, Microsoft after Gates, etc. Even after losing iconic, long-time leaders, most industry-leading companies continue to make even more money, more profitably than ever over the following decade.
RIMR | 5 hours ago
> That's what humans focus on.
I struggle to understand what narrative you're correcting here. "We" in this context seems to collectively mean "humanity". Markets, media narratives, etc. are all run by humans. That's "us", whether or not you personally want any of the blame/credit.
mrandish | 2 hours ago
I agree that markets shouldn't do that, and further, I believe they don't do that in any meaningful way. NVidia's price drop of ~20% is short-term volatility. Tracked against the NASDAQ, NVidia will likely post new all-time highs within the next 100 days.
jryan49 | 26 minutes ago
nutjob2 | 6 hours ago
He has no magic, but he did make some good strategic decisions.
Everyone is a god and a genius (in retrospect) if they found a multi-trillion dollar company, but the causation seldom runs that way.
Jobs founded Apple to great success, left and failed then returned to Apple to great success, then he died and Apple was fine. The company is more important than the individual. Nvidia will also be fine.
And clearly the US economy doesn't rest on the shoulders of Nvidia or AI, no matter the level of hype.
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
jimbokun | an hour ago
We had Democrats who are more skeptical of data center construction elected and now the CEO of one of the largest AI companies forced to step down.
If investors were already wondering if AU stocks were over inflated, these events could have been tts impetus they needed to act.
letsgofrets | 9 hours ago
WarmWash | 9 hours ago
Instead this "bubble" is packed with people who detest AI and have extremely bearish views on it's future. If this "bubble" does pop, I think it will be the first one in history that every single person saw coming.
oblio | 8 hours ago
WarmWash | 8 hours ago
Absolutely correct. That's why I mentioned the niche in my comment.
But no bubble ever has been predominately detractors.
oblio | 7 hours ago
So online discourse doesn't matter much.
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
bbor | 9 hours ago
AdmiralAsshat | 9 hours ago
In the slow evolution of the human race into the Ferengi, it is absolutely a milestone!
kphorn | 9 hours ago
Long term we want efficiency. The market is SUPER inefficient right now. People are buying GPUs and stacking them up in warehouses so that they get their allocation. Companies are taking retired jet engines, and turning them into very expensive generators. SoftBank just defaulted on a bunch of power generation orders (increased cost for everyone, but didn’t create the value). My point is that it will be a painful road to get to the efficient market which will likely be a recession because of a massive slow down in spending
marcusverus | 8 hours ago
fwip | an hour ago
delta_p_delta_x | 8 hours ago
This is demonstrably untrue. Jensen is an engineer through and through, and contributed significantly to Nvidia's early accelerators: from the NV1, at least to the earliest GeForces.
richwater | 8 hours ago
bbor | 7 hours ago
brookst | 56 minutes ago
joshstrange | 9 hours ago
He cheated, multiple times, he is scum for that.
He seems to have consorted with a spy and evaded export bans. He is a criminal for that.
Oh, but he made people a lot of money? All good! /s
Throwing all morals and ethics out the window because of the eCoNoMy is insane.
The cult of personality around CEOs is unhealthy.
kphorn | 9 hours ago
joshstrange | 9 hours ago
seunosewa | 8 hours ago
oblio | 8 hours ago
stetrain | 8 hours ago
djaro | 6 hours ago
stetrain | 5 hours ago
computerex | 9 hours ago
CPLX | 9 hours ago
taylorfinley | 7 hours ago
CPLX | 2 hours ago
taylorfinley | 39 minutes ago
By analogy: the amoral VC nitwits that own the HN servers could try to enforce their values on the discussions here, but doing so with a heavy hand would quickly drive the true 'hacker' community elsewhere. Dang has a very light hand, especially when it comes to topics around YC that get discussed here.
Sure, there are no shortage of bootlicking CEO cargo cultists here looking for the right turtleneck/leather jacket combo to ascend to their rightful place at the top of the pile with PG and Sama... And being associated with the HN community's ethos certainly gives an undeserved glow to YC, which like all VC accelerators really is just a predatory tool of the wealthy investor class to maintain control of capital (a poor kid that grows up and founds a company that creates a ton of wealth could have dangerous ideas, best to capture them early and give them an approved board and structures to constrain them...)
That said, I frequently come across things here that subvert the platform's owners. For example, I think pretty much every member of my anti-VC founder alliance [0] found it through my own comments here. I get personal joy from promoting that here, subverting YC's own platform to challenge their golden goose.
So yes, know who's house this is, but stay aware of who has the power (us).
[0] https://NOVC.fyi
djaro | 6 hours ago
I dont get how you can talk about the "hacker spirit" but then talk about "late-stage capitalism" (essentially the flat-earthism of economy) and tech founders.
computerex | 5 hours ago
> An engineer who singlehandedly created one of the most valuable companies on earth
Nvidia has 42k employees.
Nvidia chips are not the only chips AI runs on. Google for example runs everything on their own TPU's.
I don't know how you can talk so much out of your ass. Simping for billionaires is not "hacker spirit".
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
computerex | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
pesus | 3 hours ago
Can you elaborate on why you think not a single aspect of late stage capitalism is true in any capacity, like flat-earthism?
marcusverus | 8 hours ago
Anti-capitalists appealing to bourgeoisie values in their zeal to destroy a capitalist icon is pretty freakin' rich.
2OEH8eoCRo0 | 8 hours ago
sidibe | 8 hours ago
Freedom2 | 5 hours ago
pesus | 3 hours ago
doublepg23 | 9 hours ago
oblio | 9 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
doublepg23 | 6 hours ago
cliche | 3 hours ago
Jolter | 4 hours ago
elorant | 9 hours ago
kphorn | 9 hours ago
avgDev | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
boringg | 8 hours ago
Alternatively if the company tanks the board will have a reckoning similar to the OpenAI debacle.
seunosewa | 4 hours ago
nozzlegear | 47 minutes ago
Xenoamorphous | 2 hours ago
0xbadcafebee | 8 hours ago
Cisco's stock price was similarly very high during the dotcom boom, but then collapsed, and took 17 years to build back up.
The thing people keep forgetting is nvidia makes graphics cards. Not CPUs, not a range of different products. Graphics cards. With a software moat. Their only business advantage is that people currently want a lot of their graphics cards and are currently dependent on their software. All that can be competed against. China is already putting out their own cards. Google has TPUs. AMD makes both CPUs and GPUs. The memory prices will soon fall as more capacity comes online.
It's practically a certainty that this stock price will keep falling. They're valuable, but in a competitive market, likely not 10x more valuable than their $17 stock price in 2022. When they fall harder so will the AI economy.
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
lentil_soup | 8 hours ago
the stock value just represents what people think the company is (or will be) worth, them selling products at 50% margin is what brings the money, the stock value doesn't give NVIDIA extra cash (unless they're selling or leveraging their own stock reserves to get even more cash?). And definitely shareholder value is not the economy.
and also, how is the efficiency bad now? surely that allows for innovation and other companies and people to get cheaper hardware (assuming they somehow have to lower their margins because Jensen left, still don't get that argument)
kllrnohj | 8 hours ago
Nonsense. Nvidia's employees created that value, not Jensen. Jensen personally is all but certainly responsible for almost none of the value created, just like in every other company. CEO worship is absurd.
Like it's an extremely common sentiment when working for a large company to look at the SVP or CEO and go "that person is a dumbass, everyone in charge is a dumbass". Yet when looking at other companies somehow we forget about that and put the companies success on the CEO or top level execs. Instead of remembering "no, it's probably the small army below them figuring out how to manage upwards to prevent the idiot in charge from tanking everything"
neya | 8 hours ago
asadotzler | 7 hours ago
neya | 7 hours ago
Tell me you know nothing about running a company without telling me. Just because one CEO got caught screwing over a Chinese spy that doesn't mean all CEOs are useless people. That's just lazy generalization.
Edit: Guess I am arguing with a bot lol
dennis_jeeves2 | 4 hours ago
djaro | 6 hours ago
WhrRTheBaboons | 30 minutes ago
andy_ppp | 8 hours ago
kridsdale1 | 8 hours ago
It took the corporate structure and top-down direction decision ATTRIBUTABLE TO JENSEN to allow them to work so productively together.
Leadership matters. Labor Talent is only able to operate at 10% effectiveness with shitty leaders in place.
fennecfoxy | 8 hours ago
CEOs in large companies do not play a role like that.
djaro | 6 hours ago
antiframe | 5 hours ago
I prefer the view that the engineers that made GPUs have a bigger hand in the value creation.
rexpop | 5 hours ago
Phelinofist | 5 hours ago
If you think about that for 2 seconds you'll see that this is just wrong?
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
10111001 | 6 hours ago
I agree: we must do everything we possibly can to aggrandize the already wealthy and powerful. The glory must accumulate in their account, and the less that goes to their subordinates, the better.
vatsachak | 6 hours ago
sowhat1 | 5 hours ago
rexpop | 5 hours ago
Besides, individual contributors aren't incentivized to innovate insofar as we're not structurally positioned to capture a windfall.
I recognize the narrative that an army of world-class engineers is essentially inert until an executive visionary breathes purpose into them, but that's a structural property of the firm. It's a choice to route all surplus through the board and major shareholders, and to starve out any innovation that happens outside of those venues.
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
tt24 | 7 hours ago
andruby | 7 hours ago
That's a very limited view of value creation. Have you ever lead a team of people? Coached someone? Raised a child? Written a technical architecture?
A lot of people play crucial roles in a company. HR, accounting, leadership, PM's, engineers, support, etc. All of them contribute to the value creation.
If you've ever been in a company with poor leadership and one with great leadership, you'd see the impact of it on everyone working there and on the value being created.
kllrnohj | 7 hours ago
Yup, all of it. And at no point have I considered myself as 10,000x more valuable than any of the team members I led. Yet that's exactly what is done to billionaire CEOs.
You'll notice I did not say Jensen didn't create ANY value.
belg1o | 7 hours ago
Critical / hard decisions are worth more than just a manager telling / trusting his team to execute on x,y,z task.
kllrnohj | 6 hours ago
Do you know for sure that Jensen personally was involved in recruiting Ian Buck and starting up the CUDA project? A project that's largely attributed to John Nickolls? What other major decisions did Nvidia even make over the last, say, 15 years?
vatsachak | 6 hours ago
kllrnohj | 3 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
jdgoesmarching | 6 hours ago
The children yearn for a tyrant I guess.
Phelinofist | 5 hours ago
Not sure about HR TBH
dennis_jeeves2 | 4 hours ago
>That's a very limited view of value creation. Have you ever lead a team of people? Coached someone? Raised a child? Written a technical architecture?
I can assure you that the people you are targeting the question at, have never/rarely done any of the things you asked. I call them the socialists. They sit in judgment of people who do things while they lead their petty lives and all they look forward is the next Superbowl game, or next Netflix series.
(p.s you might like the writings of author by name Ayn Rand, Disclaimer: I'm no worshiper of Rand)
jacobjjacob | 6 hours ago
hatethehate | 4 hours ago
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
Sure it might be hard to run a company - it wasn't like he actually did most of that though was it?
Zigurd | 7 hours ago
Pumping billions of dollars, the source of which is obscured, into it looks like a cut out, is not just a national security problem. It undermines confidence in the numbers that you claim are the basis of shareholder value.
yalok | 39 minutes ago
LetsGetTechnicl | 7 hours ago
rolosa | 7 hours ago
rockostrich | 7 hours ago
m4rtink | 6 hours ago
mrandish | 5 hours ago
That's incredibly unlikely. NVidia and Megaspeed's relationship has been under constant separate parallel investigations by the Justice and Commerce Depts going back to the Biden administration. There have been no charges and Megaspeed was never even added to the blocked Entities List which would instantly ban all sales, despite the US govt being free to do so at any time with no justification or explanation needed.
It appears two things are simultaneously true:
- Thousands of banned GPUs were diverted to China.
- NVidia meticulously verified export licenses and complied with every U.S. law, export control and KYC regulation.
The under-reported fact is that while the US Govt chose not to add Megaspeed to the banned list, NVidia voluntarily placed Megaspeed on their own blocklist and stopped selling GPUs to them in June 2025. This was because the law requires NVidia to block any company they "know or reasonably suspect" is violating export controls. There is an extensive framework of Red Flags a supplier is required to check and certify are 'cleared'. The penalties for failing to do so are the same as violating export controls on cruise missiles (up to 20 years in jail, $1M per GPU ). And they can apply personally to each employee who knew. So, NVidia cut off one of their largest South Asian customers ~18 months ago, despite Jensen banging the customer's board member.
No, I can't explain it either. But those are the facts per WSJ & NYT reporting. The meta-subtext here is there have been two opposing factions on China policy inside the White House, NSC, and U.S. intelligence community since the Biden era. They are each constantly trying to sway Trump, who vacillates between them (as seen by inconsistent US policy swings). One of those factions leaked the 6 month-old Alice story a week ago in the hope of blocking Jensen's influence and access to Trump. It worked (probably better than expected). Now that Jensen is both out of NVidia and politically toxic, neither faction cares about him.
largbae | 34 minutes ago
undersuit | 7 hours ago
shimman | 5 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
jacobjjacob | 7 hours ago
badrequest | 6 hours ago
djaro | 6 hours ago
Unless you are a subsistence farmer, everything you have in your life is thanks to the economy and "shareholder value".
Its strange to me how many people will say stuff like "who cares about the economy, I care about people" when the economy is the thing that ensures people have food and shelter and dont starve.
lentil_soup | 5 hours ago
No it's not, shareholder value as understood as owning a piece of a publicly traded company doesn't produce anything on its own and it's definitely independent of the economy of a society. Could even be argued that the wealth stuck in the shareholder value is reducing the investments that could be being made in the interest of the rest of the economy.
I can easily make something and sell it to you without creating shareholder value.
NetMageSCW | 5 hours ago
lentil_soup | 4 hours ago
No one is talking about anything being easy or redefining a market (which, since you bring it up, has been done infinite times by private and state funded companies as well)
breuleux | 4 hours ago
jappgar | 6 hours ago
It's not just a chip company. Those trillions of value represent bets across the entire economy. When the casino goes bankrupt, all bets are off.
sailfast | 4 hours ago
Also you act like those bets were group / government decisions. They weren’t my bets. They were NVIDIA’s bets. Equity holders should lose value if the bet fails - that will not be most of the economy by a long shot. The stock market is not the economy. The Casino should not have existed in the first place at the scale it did. This is the correction everyone has been talking about when discussing “bubbles”
rurp | 6 hours ago
Pavilion2095 | 5 hours ago
dang | 5 hours ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
neya | 5 hours ago
> This would happen even if the counterfactual CEO was incompetent.
Tell that to Intel's ex-CEO.
dmonitor | 5 hours ago
everythingswan | 5 hours ago
Again, credit for putting yourself in the position to capitalize. Credit for executing. But it's pretty likely that the world would not be substantially different if Nvidia has been another company and Jensen was some guy working at MS.
dmonitor | 4 hours ago
They basically invested in pickaxes a decade before the gold rush, and people only found out about the gold because pickaxes were pretty convenient
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
formerly_proven | an hour ago
asdff | 3 hours ago
So indeed, if he was not CEO, likely whoever would have been would be given the same information as Jensen that lead to him saying yes on tensor cores. And in all likelihood, the same exact decision would have been made, or at least a coinflips odds chance if it really were a matter of "yes" or "no" with no clear winner.
keybrd-intrrpt | 3 hours ago
Many, especially the "non-founder" CEOs, are risk-averse.
There's likely many CUDA-like ideas from internal engineers shot-down or ignored by leadership at companies like Microsoft, Google, etc.
While Tim Cook certainly drove the valuation of Apple up during his tenure, one of the most common criticisms was that Apple stopped innovating and more recently their quality bar has been dropping.
manicennui | 5 hours ago
sailfast | 4 hours ago
asdff | 4 hours ago
soVeryTired | 4 hours ago
asdff | 3 hours ago
ThrustVectoring | 4 hours ago
asdff | 3 hours ago
cheesecakegood | 3 hours ago
jimbokun | an hour ago
Maybe for a short window between the establishment of strong labor unions and Reagan era deregulation.
poopingatwork | 3 hours ago
Jensen provided a platform and roadmap to help advance AI. His selflessness and leadership attracts talent.
Money might help pull talent away but it's silly to think money taken away from Nvidia will suddenly be reinvested into other pursuits.
If you don't think talent is an issue, why hasn't anyone begun seriously competing with SpaceX, TSMC, ASML?
epistasis | an hour ago
At worse, progress stalls for a year or two.
NVIDIA was at the lead and took most of the revenue and valuation because of it. But the same process would have happened with or without NVIDIA.
Now go back five years and substitute an NVIDIA collapse. Do you think that we'd be in a very different position for AI? I don't think it would be far off at all.
There were many game accelerator companies when NVIDIA started, they were just slightly better than the others, and the efficiency gains of consolidation resulted in those other companies being sold off.
ASML is definitely a one off though. And perhaps TSMC is a unique one off, but they got there by taking the most customers. If it wasn't them, then somebody else would have done it.
The key selection function was "this is the best option at the time" and if the best option hasn't existed, somebody else would have been chosen path that time, giving that other company the capital to build somethjng.
asdff | an hour ago
cjbprime | 42 minutes ago
(Notably, it kind of already has done so -- just in China rather than the US.)
poopingatwork | 10 minutes ago
Say whatever you want about those other companies: they exist right now and there is nothing stopping them from competing.
Who has the GPUs everyone wants today, and why do you think that is? Why do you need to bring in all the hypothetical thoughts?
ASML and TSMC are not one offs. When the investment cost to compete becomes so great: talent must centralize to push the frontier.
You could build exact mirror images of the factories and you will struggle to find the talent to run the factory.
asdff | an hour ago
nozzlegear | 55 minutes ago
To quote the late, great philosopher and renowned businessman Eugene Krabs:
"Money."
biggc | 31 minutes ago
He's an incredibly accomplished entrepreneur and leader, but I'm not sure what he's done to qualify as selfless.
gchamonlive | 3 hours ago
iLoveOncall | 2 hours ago
Any other idiot in his place would have made the same amount of money.
jen729w | an hour ago
Let's find out if the money exists next week when everyone tries to cash in.
simplesocieties | 16 minutes ago
another_twist | 9 hours ago
nickdothutton | 9 hours ago
jakozaur | 9 hours ago
This is a terrible decision for NVIDIA and the broader economy.
blastro | 9 hours ago
gruez | 8 hours ago
msabalau | 8 hours ago
Someone with an actual long term mindset and who had the interests of the company would have groomed one or more successors, and, if, for some reason, they felt they were indispensable, would have probably avoided jeopardizing the company by allegedly having an affair with a subordinate.
There are plenty of people in the world to sleep with besides subordinates and spies. Failing the most basic of marshmallow tests is not a indication of a consistent long-term mindset.
Jensen is a colorful, important figure in the history of technology. He did make many solid long term bets. But if the company falls apart because of his reckless actions, that that's on him too.
And if it doesn't fall apart, then the credit goes to him for resigning.
Grimburger | 8 hours ago
All I've seen is his personal relationships drama and advocating for softening of useless export laws that didn't stop a single CPU or GPU get into China in the first place, selling to Megaspeed is hardly anything unlike what AMD or other suppliers does right now.
It's a hitjob and he probably could have fought it but chose not to.
Much like the broken unenforced rules that lets OpenAI/ycombinator sell trillions upon trillions of tokens into China each week despite all the export restriction laws against them doing it.
You really think the Chinese can't pay and access ChatGPT/Anthropic/Google premium models today?
cunnymcface | 6 hours ago
I’m not even a billionaire, but the only people I interact with are people who I work with or who insert themselves into my life because they want something.
igleria | 9 hours ago
Still icky, but this person still enjoys success as a CEO of their company. Huang not anymore.
ramshanker | 9 hours ago
mapcars | 9 hours ago
listedb | 9 hours ago
codingisfreedom | 9 hours ago
Felt like he knew what he was talking about, and spoke with real passion and vision.
Watching tech keynotes these days feels like the same boring marketing script on repeat.
I’ll miss that.
verdverm | 9 hours ago
I lost faith when he was on Ezra Klein's show and said he doesn't think kids should learn math any more.
jthomas1 | 9 hours ago
meowlamoon | 9 hours ago
Meaning that the 9 people pushing him out add up to own 0.36% of Nvidia share, only 0.36%
This is betray of shareholder interest. The board doesn't own Nvidia, this is not their business, yet only they can vote. they just want to finish as soon as possible, and you get a mad result.
cochne | 9 hours ago
tacticalturtle | 9 hours ago
Shareholders voted on them in June:
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1045810/000104581026...
meowlamoon | 8 hours ago
Just look at the stock price plunge after he resigns, and I think this is structural in loss of company value instead of temporary sentiment.
He IS the company's value.
LastTrain | 9 hours ago
zahlman | 9 hours ago
ryzvonusef | 9 hours ago
Eh, i think he's acting as a heatshield for Nvidia, his affairs are irrelevant, but the Chinese sales could put both Nvidia as a company and him as CEO in jail... this allows them both to pretends it's a 'personal issue' and get away with it.
That bit with Dwarkesh was very prophetic in hindsight.
wigster | 9 hours ago
VikRubenfeld | 9 hours ago
esskay | 9 hours ago
1up8192 | 9 hours ago
hgoel | 8 hours ago
lavendermon | 9 hours ago
AI pushed Jensen into the spotlight very quickly and he didn't respond well, but he should go down in history as an extraordinary leader.
1over137 | 9 hours ago
neuwirth | 9 hours ago
everfrustrated | 9 hours ago
I suspect the real reason the board fired him is he's been lying to the board. It's not the indiscretion it's the lie that gets you.
If he was lying about his affairs with staff then maybe he's been lying to the board about following export controls and other things.
jakozaur | 9 hours ago
This is a terrible decision for NVIDIA and the broader economy. Jensen gets to retire with $100B+ and not deal with the crap.
skullone | 8 hours ago
_blk | 8 hours ago
jxf | 8 hours ago
He didn't seem to have a long-term mindset when he knowingly violated export control laws (the feds are, in general, super serious about export controls) and securities laws (the feds are also, in general, super serious about whatever they consider securities fraud) over the course of at least the last six months.
It's frustrating because it was so easily avoidable. Just don't do crimes with nation-states.
nonethewiser | an hour ago
Why do you say this? Perhaps he did but I haven’t seen it in the news. There were no export controls against a a Megaspeed.
I wouldn’t be surprised if he did because it would clarify NVIDIAs decision to get rid of him.
meowface | 8 hours ago
I'm no pro-US nationalist or anything, but I am very very much anti-CCP.
throwaway89864 | 8 hours ago
Joker_vD | 8 hours ago
> He should be thankful he's not in prison. Even without the spy and affair scandals, his lobbying to sell chips to China is treasonous due to how geopolitically critical AI will soon become. (That alone is not criminally treasonous,
He should be thankful he's not jailed for advocating something which is not even declared illegal yet? Is that the famous "rule of the law" I heard so much about?
vkou | 8 hours ago
We're in the find-out phase of the merger of the corporation and the state, where everything is permitted as long as you send some considerations to the dear leader...
Until it's not. :)
machomaster | 7 hours ago
Yes, the famous "rule for thee, not for me".
meowface | 4 hours ago
The other part is me subjectively calling him treasonous, unrelatedly; not in a criminal way.
I should've said "depending on the results of the investigation, he may end up just being thankful he won't get a prison sentence". (Or maybe he will get a prison sentence, depending on what the investigation finds. We'll see.)
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
meowface | an hour ago
Him doing that is not criminally treasonous (although if influenced by a spy there might be some sort of crime; if he knew she was a spy then it might be criminally treasonous). I say it solely in non-legal, subjective, moral terms.
gverrilla | an hour ago
afavour | 8 hours ago
Did he? A singular CEO with 40+ direct reports and no succession plan... that alone feels like a very short term mindset to me. He could have been hit by a car tomorrow, what's the contingency plan there? Not to mention the whole 'violating export restrictions' thing, that's typically not great for the long term viability of a company either.
lucaslazarus | 8 hours ago
afavour | 8 hours ago
lucaslazarus | 8 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
foobiekr | 2 hours ago
Jansen was once an engineer and a solid evangelist, but he doesn't really appear to have any skill at managing people.
bottlepalm | 55 minutes ago
Case in point: The new interim Colette Kress is a finance MBA. China is laughing at us right now. Many engineers at Nvidia are looking at the exit.
ngl999 | 9 hours ago
rtkwe | 8 hours ago
oldsklgdfth | 9 hours ago
But talk about ruining a legacy before it really took off. I don't really have sympathy. But this guy should have carried around a piece of paper with some short aphorisms to look at everyday to anchor him back to reality.
specproc | 9 hours ago
Musk has done, and continues to do, the most horrific stuff, including things far more questionable from a US security perspective. Altman's reputation is not one of honesty and fair dealing. We've had very clear evidence of Microsoft's leadership being caught in honey-traps by foreign governments. No heads rolled.
Tin foil hat take: I think Jensen's been sniped.
Traster | 9 hours ago
ryan_n | 7 hours ago
soundworlds | 8 hours ago
tancop | 7 hours ago
parthdesai | 5 hours ago
nemomarx | 4 hours ago
Philip-J-Fry | 2 hours ago
anon373839 | an hour ago
> An earlier venture, adult-film company Eddice, drew Clark into contact with Jeffrey Epstein. In 2011, she emailed Epstein a film script seeking investment, according to documents released by the Department of Justice in 2026. "We thought you and the ladies might enjoy," she wrote. Epstein did not invest.
https://dealroom.co/news/145067-anthropic-s-quiet-power-play...
s_dev | 7 hours ago
By whom?
specked-citrus | 6 hours ago
joshdavham | 2 hours ago
Rodmine | an hour ago
jasondigitized | an hour ago
specproc | 5 hours ago
The normal pathway would be that this would be disclosed to said horny capitalist via state security, with the understanding that they'll behave in certain circumstances and that it will be ensured that things go no further. This is a win for Uncle Sam.
That this didn't happen is telling. Obviously, cui bono gives quite a long list, but the state would have needed to be on side.
Tadpole9181 | 3 hours ago
1. China, to take down one of the keys to Nvidia's success and potentially sabotage US dominance in AI and hardware, right as they've started their own.
2. The US gov, who may have been worried about Jensen's "loyalty".
3. The US gov, who were previously skimming money off of illegal sales but now need to do performative justice to prevent themselves from being held accountable after the change in governance last week.
4. A coordination between the US gov and AI firms, who may not have appreciated Jensen's open-ness toward open models and likely refusal to install firmware-level blocks for "unapproved" models.
semireg | an hour ago
dimgl | 7 hours ago
Like what
IAmGraydon | 6 hours ago
ThrowawayTestr | 4 hours ago
So as not to violate ITAR? That thing where Ukraine used a gift in the way they were explicitly asked not to?
bdamm | an hour ago
Eji1700 | 6 hours ago
The others do not have a board capable of outing them. It has, in fact, been tried and discussed at length.
It's not a conspiracy, this is what happens when you don't give one person total control through manipulating the board and stock. You fuck up and get the axe.
drakythe | 4 hours ago
Eji1700 | 4 hours ago
This is, in theory, feature not a bug territory. Your CEO did something they shouldn't of (allegedly). The board now fires them rather than having the stock and the company ride or die based on it.
Will the short term stock suffer, sure. Will the company do better for it, maybe/maybe not? I don't totally agree with one great man but I get the idea and once you start working at a certain level you do see products often as a reflection of the values of the top of the chain.
Either way, there's no doubt this is a complicated and "unique" circumstance given the behavior of the US government, and I wouldn't be totally shocked if he DID knowingly break the law and did so with the help of the POTUS, and that's an entire quagmire.
The board/company distancing itself from that makes sense, and bluntly, it's not like jensen staying on was going to save the stock or AI. This is a symptom of what's going on not the cause, and him somehow not being voted out likely changes nothing, even for the board or NVIDIA who are all going to have uncomfortable questions about behavior and decisions even with Jensen out the door. Hell it might be the best place for him.
keeda | 5 hours ago
Huh, hadn’t heard of any actually, examples?
specproc | 4 hours ago
keeda | 4 hours ago
specproc | 3 hours ago
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/business/jeffrey-epstein-...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alleged_connections_between_Je...
flanz_10 | 2 hours ago
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/24/technology/jeffrey-epstei...
shimman | 5 hours ago
tty456 | 3 hours ago
oliyoung | an hour ago
This is too co-ordinated, too quick, these have been sitting in someone's inbox for a while until it was useful.
Bratmon | an hour ago
Yeah, I can't think of any activities he's been up to recently that would result in him being calm and pro-China.
janalsncm | an hour ago
I think this statement has a real risk of turning into a motte and bailey argument.
If you are only alleging that people are gunning for him, that’s true for every CEO and powerful person on the planet. People have things to gain from exploiting their positions.
mahboi | 48 minutes ago
xnx | 9 hours ago
dclavijo | 9 hours ago
ViktorRay | 9 hours ago
It's actually an excellent high quality service and with all the shortages should hopefully continue to get more and more successful. Cloud gaming will continue to become a more important part of gaming.
Now that Microsoft recently enshittified Xbox Cloud Gaming, we have a situation where GeForce Now is pretty much the only good option left.
mapcars | 9 hours ago
amelius | 9 hours ago
I mean, imagine nvidia becoming like Apple, with an AI App Store ... trying to maximize their profits above everything else.
PowerElectronix | 9 hours ago
The dude is out at the absolute top of the company because he fucked too many women he shouldn't have and in a year people will be missing him when the AI reckoning for hardware manufacturers comes.
Edit: and hairworks! That fucking shit that tanked performance but was "a game changer" due to PR. Just like the fake frames and slop filter they're pushing now.
serious_angel | 9 hours ago
These lovely cases must still be approached with pure respect for private life of everyone, and understanding, because we all are human who have feelings, and this is absolutely normal to make mistakes in love sometimes trying...
Relationships, affairs, love... this is personal and must be respected. These are some of the most complex subjects, if not the most... and infinitely magnificent feelings... where sometimes the heart and hope wins over rational actions...
Yet, this is true for every single human, isn't it? This is true about me, I believe, too. This is true about people I know in overly serious and responsible positions at critical decisions for business and lives of other people... and they know that, and stay careful.
And these cases, vulnerabilities, or operational risks... are also covered on military classes, as leadership and security awareness courses, to stay responsible for actions and consider the future - to remind that you must always evaluate the long term consequences, to the point to decide quickly in full action.
This is matter of the heart... human emotions... infinitely powerful aspects of human nature... the dear love... There's nothing to be ashamed of.
Yes, you must stay truthful to your half... the ring bound promise, which is a miracle if from love... But it is fundamentally... absolutely normal, awesome to try searching for your soulmate if you don't have peace at heart, making mistakes, trying hard...
// ---
Such public cases are either designed for public (e.g., to derail attention from something more important), or those that get out of control, which is relatively rare, I believe.
It is rare to get exposed on public since these relationships are known to limited number of people, aren't they? So samizdat is rarely responsible for it, and mass publishers are normally supervised by governments, which is expected for them to stay responsible for control of events.
Even if circumstances and consequences may be monumentally tragic or overly serious, this is love which is no less serious, and miraculously lovely awesome...
// ---
// ---And I just heartfelt sorry for the person to receive so much shame, hatred, mockering, hostility, ridiculing from public... for just his attempts to find love, his peace at heart...
There is no shame in that, I believe, absolutely. This is his business to be not exposed so disgracefully on public.
This is a miracle to proud of, to understand, and respect always.
Sincere heartwarming hug, dear Jensen... I am... sorry... for the people to ridicule on it you nor anyone deserves...
cedws | 8 hours ago
He made a very human mistake and now his personal life is on display for the world to read about. I feel sorry for him.
quixoticaxolotl | 7 hours ago
People coming at this are coming from the opposite assumption: that he's a billionaire and uses that power to fuel an appetite for lust.
I mean, if you look at the evidence, that's what the narrative supports. Both those affairs - one with Alice and one with Kimberley - overlapped in time. It's not that he fell head over heels for someone and pined for them - it's that he didn't resist the temptation to prioritize getting laid over getting love.
Further, matters of the heart are less important than doing the right thing. You don't date a direct report, period. It's unethical for everyone involved, and affects everyone of that woman's coworkers.
I am not saying there's no complexities in matters of the heart. I'm just saying this case is simple, and black and white, and not an excuse for us to turn off our eyes and ears.
cm2187 | 9 hours ago
I remember Jensen saying he doesn’t have a contract with TSMC. The whole supply is based on a trusted relationship and handshake deals between the two CEOs. I wonder if that relationship is transferable to his successor.
rowanseymour | 9 hours ago
eqmvii | 9 hours ago
is a bit of a stretch, given the reporting, intel briefings, comments from members of congress after the briefings, etc...
verdverm | 9 hours ago
yet it was an open secret among those in the know, both the affairs and the export violations
dreamcompiler | 8 hours ago
Of course China always denies this, but the evidence for this behavior over thousands of cases is such that the burden of proof is on those who claim such a person was not a spy.
This does not imply that the Chinese people or even its government are "evil" or that we shouldn't do business with them. It's just something that everybody who deals with China needs to be aware of.
Glyptodon | 8 hours ago
aaraujo002 | 9 hours ago
It's possible Tim Cook's phone is ringing right now.
It would be interesting if the story unfolded with Jensen going to TSMC [1] and Tim Cook taking over NVIDIA.
[1] https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/tsmc-founder-morris-chang-...
dreamcompiler | 8 hours ago
aaraujo002 | 8 hours ago
I'm not saying this will happen, just mentioning that it would be interesting to see it happen.
AnonHP | 6 hours ago
There’s a rumor that Apple’s Johny Srouji may be tapped to be Nvidia’s CEO. But I’m guessing Apple will do whatever it takes to retain him.
mcmcmc | 53 minutes ago
deadbabe | 9 hours ago
Merrill | 9 hours ago
Betelbuddy | 9 hours ago
You probably think Musk spend his days soldering Raptor engines...instead of posting racist memes all day while stoned on ketamine...
MrBuddyCasino | 9 hours ago
NetOpWibby | 9 hours ago
honeybadger1 | 9 hours ago
rtkwe | 8 hours ago
skullone | 8 hours ago
Windchaser | 8 hours ago
If others want him out, it was still Huang who loaded the gun and handed it to them.
dbg31415 | 9 hours ago
Think they take this stance when it's time to hand out yearly bonuses?
ThouYS | 9 hours ago
xd1936 | 8 hours ago
0c3ca83 | 9 hours ago
karim79 | 9 hours ago
Aboutplants | 8 hours ago
platevoltage | 3 hours ago
DiskoHexyl | 9 hours ago
NVIDIA's long-term future will suffer because of it, no matter how correct the decision is
achandra03 | 9 hours ago
exogeny | 8 hours ago
nielsbot | 8 hours ago
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wo%C5%BAniak
(Curiosity got me)
Betelbuddy | 9 hours ago
The resignation is evidence that no.
browningstreet | 9 hours ago
He also wasn’t a friend of the consumer. I don’t know what Nvidia becomes but he wasn’t good for me personally, or the machines I run.
DiskoHexyl | 8 hours ago
Again, the decision to oust him was correct, but finding someone with a comparable long-term vision and skill is going to be nigh impossible for the company. And sure, bring even more downvotes for that
browningstreet | 8 hours ago
--typed from a linux desktop seated next to a Mac
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
ToucanLoucan | 8 hours ago
I mean, if you set aside banging a Chinese spy and banging a subordinate, whilst married, I guess.
Betelbuddy | 8 hours ago
__natty__ | 9 hours ago
IAmGraydon | 6 hours ago
metalman | 9 hours ago
sobellian | 9 hours ago
metalman | 2 hours ago
cmiles8 | 9 hours ago
thraway3837 | 4 hours ago
alex43578 | 9 hours ago
amelius | 9 hours ago
I mean, imagine nvidia becoming like Apple, with an AI App Store ... trying to maximize their profits above everything else.
alansaber | 9 hours ago
amelius | 8 hours ago
SoftTalker | 7 hours ago
amelius | 7 hours ago
And nvidia could segment markets more strictly, e.g. starting an AI app store for the consumer segment.
To be clear: I don't want this, I just wonder what would happen if an Apple-minded CEO would take the helm at nvidia.
danielmartins | 9 hours ago
intalentive | 9 hours ago
intrasight | 9 hours ago
bigbaguette | 8 hours ago
derektank | 8 hours ago
bigbaguette | 19 minutes ago
mohamedkoubaa | 8 hours ago
intrasight | 5 hours ago
mohamedkoubaa | 2 hours ago
torginus | 8 hours ago
Nvidia is just about the only company that's both a monopoly and captured most of the value.
LoFiSamurai | 8 hours ago
uproarchat | 7 hours ago
fourside | 8 hours ago
nova22033 | an hour ago
PETA had him removed for his love of leather jackets...
We're playing the "Jensen did nothing wrong" game, right?
ramesh31 | 9 hours ago
mcmcmc | 8 hours ago
hgoel | 8 hours ago
janilowski | 9 hours ago
He was sleeping with one of his customers—a huge conflict of interest. That alone is good grounds to get a CEO fired, but it only gets worse! Alice Huang, a Chinese national, was previously working for a CCP propaganda channel network with an impeccable acronym: CCTV. Her company was accused publicly and investigated by the government for suspected smuggling of sanctioned NVIDIA hardware into China. Now we learned he also had an affair with one of his direct reports — another diabolical conflict of interest, which alone could be good reason to oust the CEO and possibly the VP as well.
It's yet to be determined whether he disclosed secrets to the Chinese spy, or whether he at least privately admitted to the second affair (if not, that's even worse!)
It's not a single, horrendous mistake anymore but a pattern of disastrously poor judgement. Building an extraordinary company and technology shouldn't mean lack of accountability, and thankfully we found out today that even at the highest level it doesn't.
[0] https://fortune.com/2026/11/09/nvidia-board-probe-jensen-hua...
ex-aws-dude | 8 hours ago
All the china stuff aside you cannot have a relationship with someone you made a business deal with
That’s like conflict of interest 101
janilowski | 8 hours ago
binarymax | 9 hours ago
avgDev | 8 hours ago
empath75 | 8 hours ago
avgDev | 8 hours ago
empath75 | 8 hours ago
There will be a lot of noise, it will be embarrassing, but I just can't imagine a situation where it significantly impacts their bottom line.
The bear case here is pretty much that you think AI is a bubble anyway, and this just accelerates it.
esikich | 5 hours ago
davidee | 8 hours ago
Copenjin | 8 hours ago
empath75 | 8 hours ago
wat10000 | 8 hours ago
zarzavat | 7 hours ago
It would be hypocritical to both use DeepSeek and also be outraged at the (alleged) mechanisms through which China acquires GPUs.
twodave | 7 hours ago
empath75 | 7 hours ago
Copenjin | 4 hours ago
ram1500natrluvr | 8 hours ago
Ezra Klein interviewed Jensen about 1.5 months ago and I had an off-putting feeling from it, and thought a lot of his answers were laughable. He sounded like he was obviously lying. A few days later, Klein interviewed Bill Gates and sort of anonymously brought up the arguments that Jensen made. You could see a visible disbelief of the arguments in Gates' face and posture, even saying "I almost can't believe you're asking that". (Not that Bill Gates is some paragon, but it wasn't close to a respectful disagreement.)
brain_staple | 3 hours ago
yibg | 8 hours ago
1. The whole spy / compromising national security thing are as far as I know unproven.
2. Affairs by themselves, while not ethical, are fairly tame compare to other prominent tech figures like Musk.
If it comes out that he did indeed compromise national security knowingly, then that's a different matter of course.
imimayj1337 | 7 hours ago
kccqzy | 6 hours ago
> We believe that despite essentially no direct compute sales into China after April 2025, Nvidia continued to service Chinese demand via sales to non-restricted intermediaries and diversion.
That’s not at all breaking export control laws. In fact it is the government’s responsibility to identify these non-restricted intermediaries and make them restricted. The government has done this plenty of times in the past and it should again do so here. It is not a company’s job to infer what the government wants it to do. The difference between selling to China and servicing China-originated demand is huge.
And then in a massive game of telephone many people on this thread actually believes that Nvidia allowed direct sales to China, which is how they conclude Huang is breaking the law.
avidruntime | 5 hours ago
kccqzy | 5 hours ago
yibg | 5 hours ago
mcmcmc | 4 hours ago
Zigurd | 7 hours ago
I'm not even that bothered about those chips going to China. But, like a lot of other aspects that leave us wondering how big and how fragile an AI bubble exists, the fact that billions of dollars of Nvidia revenue is from a reportedly priority customer that isn't actually using the chips is the problem.
wat10000 | 7 hours ago
But one of the wealthiest people on the planet gets fired, suffering zero personal hardship as a result, and everybody's up in arms. How could you do this! They all do this, how dare you single him out!
I think that there's a pervasive idea, especially in the tech/startup space, that making money is a moral good. Not merely that making money is compatible with being a good person, but that it makes you a good person, and the more you make the more good you are. Firing an ultra-rich person is therefore basically an affront to a saint. Never mind that it doesn't put them under any hardship, that they and their heirs will still be wealthier than any of us can even conceive of. It's morally wrong to do anything bad to such a good person.
jhhh | 7 hours ago
nemomarx | 7 hours ago
yubblegum | 5 hours ago
Really now. Let's get some examples of his being ruthless.
shimman | 5 hours ago
Bro, this is what the tech industry is all about: fucking over society to make a dollar.
deltoidmaximus | 4 hours ago
mcmcmc | 4 hours ago
Jamesbeam | 9 hours ago
There will be an endless walk of shame for Jensen that would constantly drag the price of the company down, because this is the perfect opportunity for the Democrats to fly out of the gate in January and put the fear of god into the other billionaire oligarchs again. Punish one with extreme measures the others will fall in line, because at the end of the day they are all pussys.
Remember Elon wanted to do cagefighting with Zuckerberg. Those two losers had every excuse ready not to fight in the end. They didn’t even touch gloves for a single sparring. Manly men. All they can do is tough talk.
Plus the voters will see at least one party is doing something against blatant billionaire corruption, with corruption being the third most important topic in the elections.
There needs to be made an example of what happens to you if you start selling weapons-grade technology to the enemies of the United States for personal profit, and then think you are above the law.
This is not over for Jensen. And also not over for Nvidia, so the only sane thing to do is get as much distance between the "rogue" CEO and the company. Same for the White House, let’s see how often we see Jensen and Trump still together.
They are going to throw him under the bus and say he had the opportunity and the access and the power to do this without anyone else noticing, especially as he was sexually manipulating managers that directly report to him on important corporate issues.
They will make it look as though it’s all Jensen’s fault because otherwise they stop being a trillion-dollar company.
It’s a fitting end for Jensen Huang.
He gets taken down by the holy trifecta of power, money and politics he valued above his own marriage or what this whole mess would do to his kids.
He even lied in his public apology because he still was confident the other affair with his married manager would never surface because he truly believes he is smarter than anyone else.
What a loser. 140B deep pockets and still a loser.
Money is only paper. All that counts is family.
Threw away his life’s work, his marriage and every last drop of respect for him as a man, father and husband his kids could ever have for pocket change and some ass.
pfdietz | 9 hours ago
gigatexal | 9 hours ago
[macrumors](https://www.macrumors.com/2026/11/12/johny-srouji-eyed-as-po...)
FLeXMurphy | 9 hours ago
HumblyTossed | 9 hours ago
luisln | 9 hours ago
soco | 9 hours ago
joering2 | 8 hours ago
zmgsabst | 8 hours ago
Musk, Vivek, etc.
joering2 | 3 hours ago
tiahura | 8 hours ago
adriand | 8 hours ago
washadjeffmad | 8 hours ago
I have a feeling we'll know the reasons for certain when Nvidia's stance on open models and local AI does an about-face.
tacticalturtle | 8 hours ago
Taek | 8 hours ago
alsetmusic | 8 hours ago
Taek | 8 hours ago
sokoloff | 8 hours ago
triceratops | 8 hours ago
sokoloff | 8 hours ago
That change is still material to the future outlook as the price is the intersection of supply and demand and the predicted supply of $NVDA shares for sale just increased by scores of billions of dollars worth.
tacticalturtle | 8 hours ago
How can you trust anything he says after this?
Why should regulators or other customers believe any promises made by him?
His credibility is shot - the day to day stock prices changes are irrelevant.
wouldbecouldbe | 8 hours ago
dd8601fn | 8 hours ago
Imo that’s danger zone shit for the company, whether you’re offended by the morality bits or not.
frankharv | 8 hours ago
Maybe he will donate his proceeds to charity...
ShinyLeftPad | 8 hours ago
esikich | 8 hours ago
iammrpayments | 4 hours ago
itishappy | 8 hours ago
snitty | 7 hours ago
OP said
>A CEO admitting to an affair with a customer *after previously denying it*, seems like a sufficient reason for removal
It's not the crime. It's the cover up.
In this case Jensen either 1) lied to the board about the affair, 2) directed the Nvidia PR to publish a materially false statement about it, or 3) both.
From a company governance standpoint it's incredibly hard to trust Jensen when he's either lying to you, using the company to protect his personal life, or (again) both.
Admitting to the affair with a customer is a nothingburger. Directing the company to release a false statement about it, and that customer turns out to be a Chinese asset if a BIG fucking deal.
Lying about it served no one's interest but Jensen's, and ended up hurting the company significantly.
dcrazy | 2 hours ago
gkoberger | 8 hours ago
jakevoytko | 8 hours ago
zmgsabst | 8 hours ago
nonethewiser | 2 hours ago
Firing him doesn’t make them any leas liable for any potential sexual harassment or favoritism that already happened
dcrazy | 2 hours ago
jan_Sate | 8 hours ago
rtkwe | 8 hours ago
snitty | 8 hours ago
It would be very difficult for the board to regain trust in his ability to make choices that are correct for Nvidia, rather than himself.
cbg0 | 9 hours ago
georgeburdell | 8 hours ago
siva7 | 8 hours ago
baldursdev | 8 hours ago
hackeraccount | 2 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
Betelbuddy | 8 hours ago
Right now, he made them lose 700 Billion dollars. So the investors lawsuit also will be the biggest in history.
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
alsetmusic | 8 hours ago
joering2 | 8 hours ago
wouldbecouldbe | 8 hours ago
The spy thing is juicy, maybe it's surface level, maybe it's deeper.
joering2 | 8 hours ago
thunky | 8 hours ago
If we fired people for infidelity the entire stock market and greater economy would tank and most of congress would be empty seats.
joering2 | 7 hours ago
thunky | 7 hours ago
esseph | 6 hours ago
You've seen the picture of the couple holding one another at the concert, right?
thunky | 6 hours ago
No they don't. They get fired for undisclosed workplace conflicts of interest and fiduciary liability, not infidelity.
HeyLaughingBoy | 8 hours ago
joering2 | 7 hours ago
Brian_K_White | 7 hours ago
An adult woman being wronged by infidelity is not remotely like a child being molested. Wth is wrong with you?
No one cares about the sex life of a ceo of a company that big except their own direct family. Investors don't care, customers don't care, vendors don't care, the government doesn't care, and that's the entire list of people that matter. His wife and other immediate family care and that's it.
The only reason anyone (of any relevance or significance) cares in this case is becsuse of the embargo & national security angle.
drinkinghorn | 8 hours ago
If they are willing to betray their own spouse then they are absolutely capable of deceiving and betraying their employees and shareholders.
This separation you seem to see between business and personal life doesn't actually exist. That's an unrealistic fantasy.
We may conceal parts of ourselves at work for politics and professionalism but you are the same person inside of work and out.
dboon | 8 hours ago
midas89 | 8 hours ago
If I was them, I'd be worried that the government invoke the Defense Production Act (DPA) or impose National Security Agreements and Clearances which would require NVIDIA to isolate sensitive R/D, restrict foreign nationals from accessing specific chip designs, and place government-vetted compliance monitors on its board or security teams. ALSO there definately will be subpeonos and probes and those are never fun.
Easier to say we cut out the guy responsible and hopefully that lessons the troubles
nxtfari | 5 hours ago
edit: btw the board has a director that’s ex-Cooley, no greenhorn I imagine to congressional investigational scrutiny. It had to be something that made them realize cutting ties with Jensen immediately was the only way to survive.
nektro | 3 hours ago
sergiotapia | 9 hours ago
Jack Clark Co-founder and head of policy at Anthropic / head of the Anthropic Institute is the nyt and @AnaSwanson "source" he is the one coordinating a coup against Jensen.
rf15 | 8 hours ago
metalspot | 8 hours ago
FLeXMurphy | 9 hours ago
bluGill | 8 hours ago
FLeXMurphy | 8 hours ago
dukoid | 9 hours ago
Yoric | 8 hours ago
Ocarina of time, on the other hand...
platevoltage | 3 hours ago
p00ki3 | 9 hours ago
Handy thing for Trump to keep in his back pocket to distract Democrats attention if they won the midterms.
mytailorisrich | 9 hours ago
DASD | 9 hours ago
jon128 | 8 hours ago
smallerfish | 8 hours ago
80fj0348i | 8 hours ago
smallerfish | 8 hours ago
80fj0348i | 8 hours ago
gruez | 8 hours ago
SSLy | 8 hours ago
IncreasePosts | 8 hours ago
phillennium | 8 hours ago
pokstad | 8 hours ago
amai | 7 hours ago
randyrand | 8 hours ago
IMO, should be illegal for company policy to retaliate against someone for a personal romantic relationship.
antiloper | 8 hours ago
breakwaterlabs | 8 hours ago
- Conflicts of interest compromise trust and judgement
- Relationships with direct reports create a conflict of interest
- Relationships with direct customers create a conflict of interest
- Policies should be set such relationships are either disallowed or require strict oversight / disclosure
- Companies should enforce their stated policies equally as required by employment law
- Affairs demonstrate a lack of judgement, a lack of candor, and are problematic for positions of trust
- An executive that lies about an affair creates a risk of blackmail and a liability for the company
dlgeek | 8 hours ago
- Relationships with subordinates is a violation of policy, demonstrating a lack of judgement and a willingness to break the rules
- Relationships with subordinates create legal liability for the company by enabling claims of sexual harassment, hostile workplace, coercion/abuse of authority
nielsbot | 8 hours ago
but I’m the CEO!
psychoslave | 7 hours ago
- every trivial action, or lack of it, is not garanteed to break some of the mountains of existing including set of rules one is supposed to obey when it's physically impossible to even assimilate them all
- people that do respect the rules can have decent level of certitude they will have a fine life without major troubles that could be avoided by breaking some rules
- the culture promote to respect rules as a viable flexible path, as opposed to actively promote one that states "it's easier to get pardon than to be granted authorization".
Everyone is welcome to assess their own society from what they experienced in life.
breakwaterlabs | 7 hours ago
psychoslave | 7 hours ago
randyrand | 8 hours ago
drewbeck | 8 hours ago
randyrand | 8 hours ago
tsunamifury | 8 hours ago
drinkinghorn | 7 hours ago
breakwaterlabs | 7 hours ago
A leader who can be blackmailed or is untrustworthy is compromised in their role. Profit, nonprofit, government: it does not matter.
That is perhaps why affairs and lack of candor are both (usually) bars to obtaining a clearance.
ex-aws-dude | 8 hours ago
Are you serious?
randyrand | 8 hours ago
antiloper | 8 hours ago
randyrand | 8 hours ago
Regardless, there is no federal law that bans relationships between bosses and subordinates, and no law that requires companies to police them.
And a law banning companies from retaliating against people for romantic relationships would not go against any current written law.
tsunamifury | 8 hours ago
antiloper | 7 hours ago
randyrand | 7 hours ago
drinkinghorn | 7 hours ago
triceratops | 8 hours ago
drinkinghorn | 7 hours ago
Even so, HR didn't do this.
wouldbecouldbe | 8 hours ago
triceratops | 8 hours ago
drinkinghorn | 7 hours ago
Reconcile that error in thinking and things will start making more sense to you.
esseph | 6 hours ago
A bunch of you on here think this is about sex, it's not, it's about signals that point to extremely poor leadership decisions and threats to the US economy and national security.
esikich | 7 hours ago
ex-aws-dude | 4 hours ago
A corporate conflict of interest occurs when an individual's or entity's personal, financial, or outside relationships interfere or appear to interfere with their ability to act in the best interests of the company or its stakeholders
bdavisx | 8 hours ago
morgango | 8 hours ago
luisgvv | 8 hours ago
He's the hero we needed but didn't deserve. If this thing didn't happen my guess is open models wouldn't exist and we would be deeper and darker into the whole AI boom
o7
sidcool | 8 hours ago
platevoltage | 3 hours ago
bitbasher | 8 hours ago
voidfunc | 8 hours ago
torginus | 8 hours ago
- we can't allow China access to buy or lease any GPUs
and
- turns out China is half the customer base, so cutting them off will crash the market, and the Chinese will just build their own anyways
Considering Trump & Jensen traveled to China just to sell more GPUs and despite that the CCP banned Chinese companies from importing Western Hardware in favor of domestic alternatives, I have my doubts this story makes sense
rafram | 8 hours ago
phillc73 | 8 hours ago
https://tech-insider.org/huawei-ascend-950pr-ai-chip-nvidia-...
rafram | 8 hours ago
Everyone, including the Chinese labs, seem to understand that Huawei's chips are not as capable as their press releases make them out to be.
Also, for what it's worth, tech-insider.org is an embarrassingly lazy AI-generated content farm: https://tech-insider.org/about/
I would hazard a guess that Huawei is paying to get positive stories about their chips on the English-language internet, because they certainly aren't getting any organically!
torginus | 6 hours ago
Also like OpenAI's Jalapeno, with LLMs it might be feasible to deploy relatively simpler silicon that's hard to program for, and farm out implementation to AI so the CUDA moat might be shallower than before.
>I would hazard a guess that Huawei is paying to get positive stories about their chips on the English-language internet, because they certainly aren't getting any organically
Jensen has said that 7nm Huawei chips are comparable to A100-level chips, and even fairly recent models as of 1>year ago were trained on those and process improvements are not what they used to be
eli | 8 hours ago
More likely would be large fines and possibly restrictions and audits of all future exports.
jlarocco | 7 hours ago
I could easily see Trump pardoning him, but I could also see him getting thrown under the bus.
eli | 3 hours ago
esseph | 6 hours ago
Death/execution is also a possibility in the US for the offense
shimman | 4 hours ago
mcmcmc | 2 hours ago
paxy | 8 hours ago
luisgvv | 3 hours ago
imjonse | 8 hours ago
olavgg | 8 hours ago
esseph | 6 hours ago
If he knowingly sent GPUs to Megaspeed knowing they would get in Chinese hands, he is guilty of Conspiracy, Espionage, SEC violations, and Export Control violations.
Just the Espionage charge alone is 20yr to life, with the possibility of execution/death penalty.
He is superfucked.
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
spwa4 | 8 hours ago
May God have mercy on us all.
FloatArtifact | 8 hours ago
thatsadude | 8 hours ago
Tadpole9181 | 6 hours ago
I hear they're (temporarily) replacing him with a non-engineer finance suit.
It would be shocking, but with gaming making up just 1/20 of their revenue, maybe someone who doesn't actually care just says "we're pulling back from the consumer market to focus on our real business."
novoreorx | 8 hours ago
techblueberry | 8 hours ago
jupake | 8 hours ago
When Cambridge Analytica happened, no one kicked Mark out of Facebook/Meta.
Not making excuses for Jensen, at his status and power level, this stuff goes with the territory. But I cant help but see a double standard here.
augment_me | 8 hours ago
Jensen messed up by splitting the power between all board members equally, and not getting a bunch of his family on a board.
The lesson is that if you do the right, non-authoritarian thing, you get punished
cornfieldlabs | 8 hours ago
egisspegis | 8 hours ago
vrmiguel | 7 hours ago
fermentation | 7 hours ago
abhinai | 8 hours ago
nullderef | 8 hours ago
monideas | 8 hours ago
alphawhisky | 7 hours ago
monideas | 6 hours ago
ngomezdev | 6 hours ago
The comparison was drawn because when you are such a position of power, your actions have such a monumental sway. Thousands, millions of people’s of lives are impacted, for better or for worse. In Jensen’s case, that’s up to the court of public opinion.
However the thinking is that when you are in that position, a just and fair society would probably want to keep just and fair and morally tact people in those positions.
IMHO I don’t care what way you want to spin it, when you have that level of influence over one of the major drivers of the AI boom, you have INCREDIBLE power compared to what most people think of when you say “private citizen”.
nullbio | 6 hours ago
alphawhisky | 5 hours ago
ngomezdev | 5 hours ago
My buddies and I were just talking about how Jensen is probably one of the MOST liked amongst all the leading big tech CEO/Owners. I feel like the amount of grace this thread is giving him is proof of that.
I don’t understand how that’s comparable to the perception of Musk.
Are you sure you are not over reacting?
ngomezdev | 4 hours ago
These tech CEOs hold a lot of influence and power. Thus they hold a lot of responsibility and must be held accountable. Point blank.
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
How did they get that tax money? Why do you think that should give anyone an ownership stake?
Do you think buying a McDonald’s hamburger should grant you partial control of McDonald’s?
kermatt | 7 hours ago
The man is smart enough to know he was playing with fire, and he got burned. The literal definition of FAFO.
monideas | 6 hours ago
ngomezdev | 6 hours ago
monideas | 4 hours ago
The thing he did that was actually wrong was that the NVIDIA executive he was in a sexual relationship with was herself married. That is actually wrong, that’s not “playing with fire”, that’s simply wrong.
Henchman21 | 7 hours ago
monideas | 6 hours ago
Thrymr | 6 hours ago
monideas | 5 hours ago
And just to be clear in practice, stocks are not priced based on their voting rights but rather expectations of their future cash flows (dividends) or simply how much the stock is expected to go up or down by. A lot of modern financial activity is nonsense.
If you really want to actually understand what a company is you should go look up when corporations became a thing and why. It had to do with various legal protections to stimulate economic activity and tax revenues.
All of these modern notions and principles that you’re invoking or basing your arguments on about ownership are most likely just contrived nonsense. These aren’t necessarily eternal principles of anything.
deaton | 5 hours ago
logicchains | 6 hours ago
m4rtink | 6 hours ago
drstewart | 5 hours ago
Henchman21 | 2 hours ago
Is it my view that Meta has engaged in a sustained course of unlawful conduct that persists despite the judgements the law has already applied, and will persist into the future. As a corporation who is consistently in court, and based in Delaware, it surely seems to me the bar has been passed -- the AG of the state would be well within their rights to revoke their charter. Meta's entire basis of being at this point is to control public discourse. That's direct harm to the state and the public at large.
What happens to their assets afterwards is a job for the courts. Applying existing law is "retroactive authoritarian". Pfft, please. Ignorance of the law is not a defense against it.
lukebechtel | 5 hours ago
monideas | 4 hours ago
What is the actual value add of a “board of directors” except to basically be weak willed PMC/non founder-type people with a lot to lose reputationally and financially who can be cowed and/or blackmailed very easily.
The typical person on the board of a public company would fold to pressure as soon as they saw a NY Times reporter called their phone.
hgomersall | 2 hours ago
monideas | 2 hours ago
So this just proves my point.
zen928 | 6 hours ago
Cheating on your wife and betraying your country is the right, non authoritarian thing? We arent having this discussion for any other reason than those two events happening. Its an insane lens of entitlement to view the situation as if he should indefinitely retain ownership due to ... what? Existing? But never have any of his actions have consequences. That's the promise you make by positioning the board shares in that manner: you promise to have accountability. Finding it a weakness to answer to others for your actions is definitely a popular style of thinking amongst the current group of wanna-be authoritarians in the presidential cabinet, "strange" how your first two examples of CEOs unwaveringly align with that political faction huh?
augment_me | 6 hours ago
If you are competing in a neoliberal environment where other companies play by these rules, you are at a disadvantage if you are following some superset of them.
I am not saying that he has done 100% right things, I am just saying that if he set himself up in the same way as his competitors, he would have been fine. Maybe he would have to pay some fine/bribe, similar to what the prior 2 have done for their infractions against the people.
Starman_Jones | 4 hours ago
calf | 3 hours ago
You don't have to agree with leftists but ignoring the premise just lets you talk past the point.
Starman_Jones | 2 hours ago
Jensen chose to set up his company in such a way that he had to follow a superset of the rules that his competitors did. My point is that was a competitive advantage; even though it unmade him, that superset was a necessary tradeoff to be the head of a $4T company. We can see this because those other companies have started to be held financially accountable; the same lack of accountability that lets those leaders get away with affairs also lets them “get away with” withholding evidence (and the resulting $243M punitive damages). Unaccountable power (which is what parent is arguing for) is brittle and fragile.
dopamean | 5 hours ago
blini-kot | 2 hours ago
you have to be jesting to use this term in the board of directors of one of the most expensive corporations out there
freshtake | 8 hours ago
The biggest questions are:
1. Did Jensen knowingly compromise national security (criminal implications) 2. What is the fallout / impact in the AI arms race
HeavenFox | 8 hours ago
Gareth321 | 8 hours ago
Shareholders don't care that he's having sex outside his marriage.
flowerlad | 4 hours ago
lkbm | 2 hours ago
As a shareholder, I care.
> That only increased shareholder profits.
False, because:
> It is the US govt that should care about this.
The US government does care about NVIDIA breaking some very serious laws, and for that reason it is not good for shareholder profits.
falsemyrmidon | 8 hours ago
stetrain | 8 hours ago
Government could hold him accountable, and some of those gears have been turning over the last decade. In response he has spent a lot of money trying to steer elections and gain the influence of the ones in power to try to avoid accountability from that direction as well.
The double standard is that if you play capitalism well enough you are shielded from the consequences that others would face.
collyw | 7 hours ago
henry2023 | 6 hours ago
shocking illegal behavior? Buying votes in an election with his 1 million per day republican votes lottery.
The list is large and clearly Elon has been much more damaging to the public than Jensen but he has spent much more to be close to politicians so no consequences for him.
4ggr0 | 6 hours ago
fourside | 7 hours ago
muddi900 | 7 hours ago
Yes Elon and Zuck are abhorrent, but when they have tried to break the law, they have been held accountable in some sense. Not to the extent that they deserve it, but still.
If they become as big a libility to their businesses, even their controling shares won't save them
kccqzy | 6 hours ago
There’s no actual evidence that Huang broke a national security law. Even if there is, we need the federal prosecutors to say so rather than random commentators on the internet. Even when prosecutors say so in this country we presume people to be innocent until proven by court to be guilty. I have personally looked into the rumors and I don’t believe Huang broke any law.
vhiremath4 | 7 hours ago
Second, there is no proof that any moral standard is being applied at all. This could (and in my opinion likely) have nothing to do with a moral standard and more to do with extenuating information uncovered in the investigation or a strategic shift to protect against the current admin. There is likely so much happening behind the scenes and so many people have so much money to lose, I think it’s prudent for us to first exhaust all non-moral possibilities (unfortunately).
dluan | 7 hours ago
iknowstuff | 6 hours ago
What kind of a shill are you exactly? U post a lot about China
serioussecurity | 7 hours ago
SkyPuncher | 7 hours ago
In my eyes, this all comes down to the perception that someone is able to be compromised by non-monogamy. Jensen came out, apologized to his wife, and (at least publicly) communicated that he broke the expectations and boundaries of their relationship. This clearly communicated that a secret relationship compromises his position. And, should there be more secret relationships they'd continue to be used as leverage.
Musk isn't subject to this leverage because it's pretty clear that his relationships are not built on traditional definitions. Non-monogamy is either a clearly defined boundary in his relationship or simply not something that concerns him as leverage.
gtirloni | 6 hours ago
raincole | 7 hours ago
hyraki | 7 hours ago
m4rtink | 6 hours ago
insane_dreamer | 6 hours ago
the board must know that the risk of Jensen staying on (likely due to whatever hasn't yet been brought to light) is greater than the risk of instability by firing him; whatever is unknown to us must be pretty serious (again, not in terms of more affairs, but other stuff, like selling chips to China or whatever)
Meta's board probably would have fired Zuck over the CA scandal but they were unable to because of the company structure
sfink | 4 hours ago
That's not certain. I tend to agree with you, but it is possible that the concern is for the effect on the employees. Especially the 2nd known affair is a violation of HR rules that are supposed to apply to everyone, and it's hard to argue that when you don't apply them to your CEO. By itself, I'm highly doubtful it would be enough (you can slap him on the wrist or something), but the effect on morale and company culture is a much larger concern. If people lose confidence in the company, they're more likely to jump ship, so you pay them more. And if investors lose confidence over any of this, then that's a much bigger and more expensive problem. There's a moral standard behind these types of things, even if it doesn't directly matter.
What we don't know and what really happened at the emergency board meeting are probably the key here. I'm sure there's plenty more going on that we can't see. More affairs are obviously possible, which is kind of meh until you find out who they were with and what deals they were part of.
It's even possible that Huang made the call -- it's not like he's going to escape public shaming at this point, and depending on his calculations of the repercussions, he could easily have tens of billions of dollars riding on this. He is clearly good at taking actions that maximize the market value of his company -- might this be another such action? Our armchairs aren't the best perspective from which to evaluate that.
chakintosh | 5 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 5 hours ago
Elon’s comparable fuck-up was betraying Ukraine with his Starlink intervention. It’s a huge deal. Unlike Nvidia, he has no Board to hold him accountable, it will have to be done by the Congress and states. (Europe will be useless as usual.)
As a result, that hammer will fall much more directly on his companies. It will just take more time to do so.
Zuckerberg, to my knowledge, hasn’t compromised American security in a comparable way to these two.
alt227 | 5 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 5 hours ago
I had this exact conversation about Jensen with a Silicon Valley executive checks notes on Monday night.
There is a bubble that doesn’t seem to see the wave of contempt across the American political spectrum for these executives.
bluefirebrand | 4 hours ago
Or if they do see it they don't care. This bubble is convinced they are untouchable
JumpCrisscross | 4 hours ago
If this were just the elites being out of touch, that would be one thing. It's more. There are rafts of folks–you can see them on here–who are convinced the only reason Jensen could be facing any wrath right now is because of a hare-brained conspiracy. This is honestly-felt fandom bordering on zeal.
ThrowawayTestr | 4 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 3 hours ago
You're saying Musk didn't know Ukraine was using these terminals for war, including air defenses, for the last few years? Despite constantly tweeting about it? And doesn't know that's what they're being used for now? What?
The best evidence for this being more ketamine nonsense is that Musk initially lied about the cut-off having been Trump's decision. Unfortunately, this time his actions may have crossed into treason–when he did this, he gave aid and comfort to an ally of a country America was at war with (Iran).
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
And considering Trump is aiding Putin who aids Iran, I don’t think Elon will face any consequences regardless of the truth.
JumpCrisscross | an hour ago
I don't. Musk himself conceded and gave the B.S. about ToS violations.
In any case, sure, he can say it actually wasn't him under oath. Burn that pardon.
> considering Trump is aiding Putin who aids Iran
Trump is the President. Musk is a private citizen.
> don’t think Elon will face any consequences regardless of the truth
I had this exact conversation with a Silicon Valley executive about Jensen Huang on Monday. There is a blind spot in Silicon Valley about the fury aimed at tech executives from across the political spectrum.
The fact that a bunch of people are publicly tweeting that this was a mistake shows just how clueless our cadre of SV elites are.
flowerlad | 4 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 4 hours ago
Never said anything close to that.
I think it's horrible. And it's an issue that's gotten multiple Fortune 100 CEOs fired [1]. It's categorically distinct from corruption and compromise of national-security laws.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/11/12/business/nvidia-jensen-hu...
bcooke | 4 hours ago
Certainly feels to me like compromising American security
manicennui | 4 hours ago
baxtr | 4 hours ago
Corporate governance was apparently not a strength of Mr Huang.
semiquaver | 2 hours ago
dennysora-main | 2 hours ago
Actually, problems where the ownership structure causes CEOs to be removed have been happening over the past 10 years or so.
For example: OpenAI's Altman, Musk, and so on.
Therefore, the ownership structure of Musk's new company SpaceX, which allows him to keep the company firmly under his control, is a very smart approach.
I think a large portion of new companies in the future will become like this.
vonneumannstan | an hour ago
hackles_raised | 8 hours ago
Kuyawa | 8 hours ago
We will never change, thank god AI doesn't have sexual instincts... yet
hackles_raised | 8 hours ago
motbus3 | 8 hours ago
(bad) jokes aside, it seems that the us gov probably dont believe enough on the affair case for gpus to appear in china and they got rid of the guy
i think this might be the end of an evolution era for nvidia.
thatslast | 8 hours ago
cornfieldlabs | 8 hours ago
One should never give up control it seems. Zuck is right.
nozzlegear | 8 hours ago
ks2048 | 4 hours ago
viklove | 2 hours ago
He's a <3.5% shareholder.
He then carried out actions which put the jobs of people smarter than him at risk, and also put the capital that gave him a platform at risk.
He got what he deserved imo.
mcmcmc | 35 minutes ago
shevy-java | 8 hours ago
What is, however had, more interesting is that many of his statements did not age well. Now, mind you - I still think it is his private life at the end of the day; one can reason about foreign spies, but then the same question can be asked about Trump and his strange addiction to Putin. As well as how Jen-Hsun was so obedient to a mainland-China female, when the other Taiwanese are scared of being possibly invaded and subsequently killed by dictator Xi, just as dictator Putin commits to his own personal genocide against Ukrainians right now.
But, with regards to statements, I distinctly remember Jen-Hsun berating the british as incompetent economists. I watched that on a shorts on youtube; can not find it right now (google search AND youtube search sucks to no ends now). Well - he may be right that the UK suffers huge economic problems, but boy, this has not aged well. People will poke fun at his love of women potentially being spies while berating the british as being too incompetent in economics. Perhaps he was too incompetent in his own love life?
coo1estguy | 8 hours ago
Windchaser | 8 hours ago
Sleeping with a spy or sleeping with a subordinate are both f**ing with the business.
boltzmann64 | 8 hours ago
Aboutplants | 8 hours ago
godockly | 8 hours ago
reactordev | 8 hours ago
Starman_Jones | 3 hours ago
reactordev | 2 hours ago
Starman_Jones | an hour ago
radomird3 | 8 hours ago
abhinai | 8 hours ago
nunez | 5 hours ago
miraculixx | 8 hours ago
quixoticaxolotl | 8 hours ago
Perhaps this may help explain why it's unethical to date a direct report to those HNers:
- It's unfair to the coworkers of the subordinate, because the affair can give the impression of influencing promotion, personnel and monetary decisions you make in favour of the subordinate.
- It places your direct report in a compromising position. Such a relationship is potentially coercive, because the direct report may fear reprisal, rendering any consent invalid. Many have commented that imputing coercion to any power imbalance leads to the absurd conclusion a rich person shouldn't date at all - however, this use of "slippery slope" doesn't offset your ethical duty as a leader. As the boss, you have to protect your employees, and placing them in this situation in the first place violates that commitment.
tl;dr you violate your duty of care, plain and simple, to everyone underneath you by doing this.
A pragmatic, ethical workplace policy is to instead date people not in your reporting chain. If that means you shouldn't date your employees as CEO, then that's responsible behaviour, not a chafing limitation.
---
Others have commented that Jensen's affair is plausibly fine because "we don't know his private affairs". Jensen has made an unambiguous statement about hurting his wife and family - if they were non-monogamous, Jensen has had the opportunity to disclose it. Absent that, you have to assume this was an illicit affair. Moreover, none of this changes the fact that having an affair with a direct report was entirely unethical.
Still others have attempted a whataboutism by asking why "other CEOs" haven't had this level of blowback for having an affair with a subordinate. Unfortunately, not every tragedy gets the same level of public reaction, for no other reason than timing, luck, or lack if engagement. We should be equally upset about all the other cases as a general rule, rather than relying on normalized apathy to lull us into complacence.
sbochins | 8 hours ago
noideawhatididt | 8 hours ago
lotsofpulp | 8 hours ago
_ink_ | 8 hours ago
max_sendfeld | 8 hours ago
me551ah | 8 hours ago
IceHegel | 8 hours ago
Export controls have been skirted since the Bronze Age.
Sure on the merits, there’s enough for the board to ask him to resign.
But it’s his company. He built it from nothing. You have to start with that.
1970-01-01 | 8 hours ago
dluan | 7 hours ago
Huawei just announced a fully domestic computer, Deepseek is rumored to be training v5 right now on entirely domestic Ascend chips.
I know eventually there will come out all the justifications for how this was to protect AGI, etc. But this move has also now tipped the scale beyond just the hardware bifurcation, but also the open vs. closed and commons vs. sovereign models. This isn't just chopping off your nose, this is America purposely gouging out it's eyes and removing it's ability to see down the road. Jensen Huang was the world's best shot and trying to keep a global AI world together, but one side has made their voice on that extremely loud and clear.
saturn8601 | 6 hours ago
MaKey | 5 hours ago
rationalist | 4 hours ago
rightbyte | 5 hours ago
potwinkle | 3 hours ago
mcmcmc | 55 minutes ago
segfault99 | 23 minutes ago
Naturally the Little People rejoice.
neya | 7 hours ago
slow_typist | 7 hours ago
xbmcuser | 7 hours ago
arlattimore | 7 hours ago
hit8run | 7 hours ago
ReptileMan | 7 hours ago
rcr-anti | 7 hours ago
The quote about succession planning is also a little out of context, he phrased it more that there should be continual information and responsibility sharing such that succession planning is effectively redundant or unnecessary.
I always wondered why investors were ok with not having any control due to dual structure shares and board composition. A "Great Men" theory of the world is a convenient and satisfying narrative, but it's usually not the best at explaining things. As the saying goes, "The cemeteries are full of indispensable men".
dozerly | 7 hours ago
eatsyourtacos | 2 hours ago
quentindanjou | 7 hours ago
eldenring | 7 hours ago
xboxnolifes | 6 hours ago
charlieyu1 | 6 hours ago
doublepg23 | 6 hours ago
torginus | 5 hours ago
The market has reacted this way for a reason - Nvidia share prices fell a lot over the past few days.
If the espionage probe was serious (and it was known about in intelligence circles going back as much as a year), it would be handle much differently, with charges brought agains him or his company being sanctioned.
drakythe | 4 hours ago
Panoramix | 4 hours ago
LetsGetTechnicl | 4 hours ago
xnx | 4 hours ago
Panoramix | 3 hours ago
drakythe | 2 hours ago
Also irrelevant to the discussion at hand. Another powerful person wasn't punished while the woman he took advantage of was. That doesn't make this okay. It is a thing that happened and that we should strive to eliminate.
csallen | 4 hours ago
Many people could just say the exact opposite of your sentence, i.e. "not a disqualification" and "can still be trusted". Furthermore, These people could supply many historical examples of leaders who did similar things and went on to remain great/effective leaders of the things they were charged to lead.
enraged_camel | 3 hours ago
It may not be a fact per se, but in the United States it is widely agreed upon that romantic relationships with subordinates is a big no-no from an ethics perspective (due to power dynamics and high potential for abuse), in addition to being a serious liability for the company.
NetMageSCW | 3 hours ago
drakythe | 2 hours ago
voxl | 3 hours ago
drakythe | 2 hours ago
torginus | an hour ago
robrain | 4 hours ago
With a sane administration that hadn't possibly looked the other way due to emoluments (allegedly), maybe. Who knows what the response will be from the current mob (gentle pun intended).
eatsyourtacos | 4 hours ago
mcmcmc | 4 hours ago
It’s also absurd that you’d think this is totally fine when the smart shareholders will be suing Nvidia for their malfeasance in evading export controls and incompetence in making sure their CEO doesn’t violate sexual harassment laws
torginus | an hour ago
Also dating your coworker is not sexual harassment - sexual harassment is when you make unwelcome advances
afavour | 3 hours ago
My pet theory about why it was leaked is because the very serious reports were sent to the White House and they then did absolutely nothing about it. Just because this, wildly corrupt, current administration has not brought charges does not mean it won't happen in the future.
mahboi | 3 hours ago
If someone holds NVDA, nothing out of their mouth about NVDA matters to me. Even if they're stating a fact, cool, I can find those from someone else. The only exception is if they're willing to double down after, then I'll listen.
tomjen3 | 7 hours ago
There is no doubt that his sexscapades were stupid, but at the same time there is only one question that should matter for the board. Will the shareholders make more money with him or without?
criddell | 7 hours ago
Sure, but his selling into China might be criminal. Or would you also excuse criminal behavior that's profitable?
therealdrag0 | 4 hours ago
criddell | 4 hours ago
therealdrag0 | 3 hours ago
But do they know more material information that we would all agree makes this not a hysterical witch hunt I don’t think we can be so confident about that.
Even if their information comes from American security personnel that should still be taken with the grain of salt.
We all remember Iraq, don’t we?
criddell | 2 hours ago
https://culperresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/Culper...
csh0 | 7 hours ago
Supreme Court disagrees that a company is required “only required to maximize shareholder value”, do you have any evidence to support your claim otherwise?
[0]https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-supreme-court/13-354.ht...
SaucyWrong | 6 hours ago
gtirloni | 6 hours ago
hirako2000 | 6 hours ago
bluefirebrand | 6 hours ago
I think "can we trust this person to act in the best interests of this company?" is a more accurate question
I don't think these scandals are in NVidias best interest, and the hits the share value have taken seem to support that
deaton | 5 hours ago
stetrain | 7 hours ago
retwakm4 | 3 hours ago
locallost | 6 hours ago
biggoodwolf | 6 hours ago
Andrex | 6 hours ago
"He created so much shareholder value."
"Unlike Elon he shared the wealth with the company."
"The US is worse off without him."
I'm sorry but a patsy who is this gullible, or a CCP-friendly traitor that is this slimy (the jury is still out), should not be in this position of power.
Cool for all he accomplished so far. This isn't a situation that deserves a second chance.
sneak | 3 hours ago
I don’t care one whit who he sells chips to, or who he’s fucking when he’s not selling those chips. The US government’s geopolitical agenda is not my geopolitical agenda.
That isn’t immoral, it’s normal and reasonable.
mahboi | 3 hours ago
JumpCrisscross | 5 hours ago
If you want Exhibit A for the moral corruption of Silicon Valley’s culture, this is it. And it’s not tied to shareholdings. It’s the quasi-monarchic strain of worship that has been poisoning Valley culture for at least a decade now.
ngruhn | 4 hours ago
mahboi | 3 hours ago
whalesalad | 5 hours ago
Meanwhile we have a felon in the white house (sexual assault) among an immeasurable number of other supposed crimes
Starman_Jones | 4 hours ago
lowbloodsugar | 4 hours ago
Ah yes. Being gay disqualified you from security clearance. Why? Because if you are gay, then you can be blackmailed. Why? Because you might lose your security clearance.
azqa | 7 hours ago
portmortem | 7 hours ago
tandr | 6 hours ago
NetMageSCW | an hour ago
0o777 | 7 hours ago
About their new interim CEO Colette Kress:
Jensen bought Mellanox for $7B in 2020. In Q2 2026 it generated $17.5B in revenue or ~18% of Nvidia's total revenue.EcommerceFlow | 7 hours ago
AlphaSite | 7 hours ago
Very very few HW CEOs have even the slightest ability to appreciate the key strength of Nvidia which is ability to build hardware and then drive it with outstanding software.
Look at AMD. Great hardware but hamstrung by their software for 20 years.
Hardware is not enough.
edelbitter | 6 hours ago
tonymet | 7 hours ago
Every influential person, even middle managers, have a laundry list of “scandals” . The real question is why now and why him.
_bobm | 7 hours ago
Nvidia was/is such a fundamental cog in the american ai economy/ machine, what spies, what cheating are people obsessed about? Nvidia created the capital for its own success; read about it, think about it, be against it, be for it. The capital did not exist, they created it by neoclouds buying hardware which they wouldnt need for two years ahead by lender and vendor-backed financing; hardware, which would be replaced in another 2-4 years.
Will nVidia continue to provide the same backing to neo-clouds? Without nVidia backing are lenders willing to give more or less?
Forget about chinese openweight models, antropic or oai, I see this development as a huge spanner in the us ai economy, maybe the biggest blunder of the year, the biggest own goal if it came from within the us administration under or without guidance.
And finally: Jensen selling to the chinese iron. Okay, was he the only one, god amongst mortals, in the fricking room. Who the heck comes up with these shallow plots...
brcmthrowaway | 7 hours ago
mcoliver | 7 hours ago
"We had a situation where somebody was reported to us to be doing something bad with AI. We called them very strongly and said get ready to go to jail."
Wish the interviewer would have let him talk more instead of changing the subject.
taco_emoji | 7 hours ago
rixed | 7 hours ago
At least the Chinese spy story is more charitable than if they had found his name in Epstein files.
xyzsparetimexyz | 7 hours ago
This event = some stuff that happens in book 2/ movie part 3 Stuff
t1234s | 7 hours ago
holden_nelson | 7 hours ago
adellascio | 7 hours ago
divergent21 | 7 hours ago
Whether one deserves such ruination is a moral matter, and everyone is entitled to their own judgement, but it seems wrong to concentrate such power in a private for-profit entity. The entire basis of anti-fascist doctrine is infringement of individual liberties and modern societies, while mostly conditioned to be against government coercion are remarkably comfortable with corporate coercion, dressed up in the pretty language of compliance and organizational reputation. A company is an economic entity, not a moral entity. It is fine with being a moral entity when it comes to matters of its own reputation and operations, but conveniently becomes an economic entity when it is time for layoffs. Ultimately, it comes down to who has a bigger stick
The thing is an organization is not just a place where you work; it is a provider of economic security, livelihood, and dignity. This concentrates extraordinary power in your place of employment; you are to clock in 5 days a week for at least 8 hours a week; and then work in a highly locked down corporate machine, which you are not allowed to customize even though this is where you will spend the majority of your week in, and one has to ask the question to what extent a company owns your life.
I think that we must also identify the cultural contradiction here; where Hollywood and the like in a sense glorify promiscuity and depict wealth as flaunted with assets and women, as a cultural ideal, and then turn around and hound creatures who are products of such a culture.
Of course, in this case it is far more likely that Jensen was involved with some national security incident.
chj | 6 hours ago
ionwake | 6 hours ago
incahoots | 6 hours ago
Outside of the continued selling to China/skirting the export ban I’m of the belief that he was offered a better deal in China, took it, then signaled he was departing, the timing on this seems…suspect.
Recalling the May POTUS and CEO field trip to china, the lot returned together with Jenson extending his stay nearly two weeks afterwards.
IMO this ongoing theatre provides cover to oust Jenson and vilify him before he appears somewhere in China —- imagine how the share price would fair if it came to light that he was leaving as CEO to take a position in Huawei…
thraway3837 | 4 hours ago
xivzgrev | 6 hours ago
The investigation is just starting. He's been indicted but not proven guilty yet. What if the facts come to light and the issue is overblown or wrong?
He also hasn't had the chance to properly defend himself.
This is a permanent fix for a potentially temporary problem, and that is short sighted
ASinclair | 6 hours ago
CurrentB | 4 hours ago
ngomezdev | 6 hours ago
Gives some light to understanding why the world is the way it is. No further comment :P
u1hcw9nx | 6 hours ago
Suggestion:
Replace Jensen the President with Tim Cook.
Replace Jensen the CEO with Ian Buck (Inventor of CUDA, PhD, vice president of hyperscale and high-performance computing).
brink | 6 hours ago
Danox | 6 hours ago
Bad luck for Microsoft. That Surface computer, team up probably goes up in smoke.
FrustratedMonky | 6 hours ago
Maybe as a little test of the necessity of CEO's.
Maybe plug in an AI CEO to see what happens.
insane_dreamer | 6 hours ago
There's huge risk in firing a very successful CEO without anyone ready to replace him.
No one really cares about the affairs, so I think the only thing that could push the board do this would be the threat of more damaging stuff coming out, like nVidia skirting the China ban, or a legal threat to Jensen that envelops the company. Or back-channel pressure from the US Gov.
CSMastermind | 6 hours ago
krick | 5 hours ago
SaucyWrong | 4 hours ago
I don't need to hear why you think they did it. I'm already familiar with the "why" behind this crazy theory. I would like to know how you think it's possible they did this.
WalterBright | 6 hours ago
vessenes | 6 hours ago
hero4hire | 6 hours ago
Banging 1000 women while married is Chinese "Boss" behavior.
The cause and effect is that any and all future CEOs caught in a honeypot will be easier to compromise. Xi loves the news. Nerds with one billion dollars hoping to attain unlimited groupies will need proper Hollywood Handlers. HR for whore intake if you will. Until the sex robots arrive.
Since this company has abandoned gamers for AI. Plus allegedly giving away a few million plus chips (gamers get fucked) to China. I am fully on his wife's side. She was there at the beginning.
Luckily we know that American courts are one sided. Making the upcoming divorce more costly then the Bill Gate's Foundation implosion. What's the over/under divorce cost trending on Polymarket right now? Seems undervalued.
zergrush | 6 hours ago
None of them are able to put two and two together that this was a deliberate coup
And it seems like nobody is paying attention to what Jensen Huang was fighting for. He was against regulation of open source local models. He was against regulation shifting liability of local model developers as well as frontier models.
All in all without Jensen, it isn't just about NVIDIA, there's no one to champion for open source models and running them locally is going to get a lot harder and expensive. It's actually going to accelerate the monopolization of closed models and they will have to pass on the costs to consumers.
It's an L across the board and I'm noting the degraded quality of discourse on HN and that nobody is seeing through the veil here.
MaKey | 5 hours ago
mcmcmc | 43 minutes ago
SaucyWrong | 4 hours ago
You may think that's a ridiculous bigger picture, but that's the bigger picture I'm looking at. I think your bigger picture of, "this is an inside-the-industry coup to remove the one champion of open weights models," is even more ridiculous.
Both of these notwithstanding, what makes you believe nvidia's new permanent CEO won't also be a champion for open weights? An open weights ecosystem is better for their business long term.
abidlabs | 3 hours ago
w10-1 | 6 hours ago
If this was about national security or evading the law, it would have happened when it was discovered.
The board didn't have the determination either to fire him or to protect him, and he realized they wouldn't be able to make a decision, so he did it for them.
Now we'll see yet another jewel taken over by bean counters because the board was so dependent.
Let's hope other founders have boards who can actially handle their responsibilities.
bifftastic | 6 hours ago
nunez | 6 hours ago
dzonga | 5 hours ago
whether that's good for nvidia or the u.s at large - I doubt - but time will tell.
minraws | 5 hours ago
Though I think it's best for everyone atm for him to have checked out, it's not fun to have your life be out through this nonsense.
I would have to assume that that the amazing almost rockstar esque popularity was the cause of the mistakes he made.
mrlonglong | 5 hours ago
kuberwastaken | 5 hours ago
1. Jensen Huang - Co-founder, President & CEO
2. Tench Coxe - Former Managing Director, Sutter Hill Ventures
3. John O. Dabiri - Professor of Aeronautics & Mechanical Engineering, Caltech
4. Dawn Hudson - Former CMO of the NFL, former CEO Pepsi-Cola North America
5. Harvey C. Jones - Managing Partner, Square Wave Ventures
6. Melissa B. Lora - Former President, Taco Bell International
7. Stephen C. Neal - Lead Independent Director; Chairman Emeritus, Cooley LLP
8. Suzanne Nora Johnson - former Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs
9. A. Brooke Seawell - Venture Partner, New Enterprise Associates
10. Aarti Shah - Former SVP & Chief Information/Digital Officer, Eli Lilly
11. Mark A. Stevens - former Managing Partner at Sequoia Capital"
1 - https://x.com/snowmaker/status/2120902014389694684
TZubiri | 5 hours ago
This was the founder? Damn!
I get that hardware requires much more capital and investment than a pure software company, but he had crossed the board-being-able-to-fire-you rubicon looong ago
tahoeskibum | 5 hours ago
Jaauthor | 5 hours ago
atleastoptimal | 5 hours ago
Invariably it will be recognized that the weakest link in any part of any organizations are the humans. Humans once had a monopoly on long-term strategic thinking so capital had to confer them authority and compensation, but once AI supersedes humans in these respects, then the human element will be aggressively excised from any company where human flaws put the strength and compettive advantage of that company at risk.
A robot employee never has affairs, never sleeps, never needs worker's compensation for injury, never sues the company. When trillions of dollars are on the line, eliminating risks like this is a trivial decision.
brink | 5 hours ago
I know some people have AI girlfriends, but most people are not willing to (nor do I think they should) make that jump to trying to relate to their robot coworker.
I hope it's the same for people making a company. If not, we are heading towards a very lonely world.
atleastoptimal | 4 hours ago
Of course there will be the minority of artisanal companies that accept the lovable flaws of fellow humans, but they will not be profitable, will not drive growth, and will not inherit the capital future. A market economy will sell to the highest bidder, and the buyer which has more money because it aggressively pursued the most efficient option at every opportunity will invariably be the highest bidder.
airstrike | 5 hours ago
mv4 | 5 hours ago
dev_l1x_be | 5 hours ago
utopcell | 5 hours ago
toisanji | 5 hours ago
keeda | 5 hours ago
Nvidia is a profitmaxxing company in a profitmaxxing economy and so it is going to profitmaxx; the criticism should lie with the US government: https://www.reuters.com/world/china/republican-senator-urges...
btkramer9 | 5 hours ago
quentindanjou | 5 hours ago
keeda | 4 hours ago
QGQBGdeZREunxLe | 4 hours ago
keeda | 4 hours ago
drudolph914 | 4 hours ago
original article: https://www.axios.com/2026/11/11/bessent-lutnick-megaspeed-n...
full article: https://archive.is/tAVBq
curiousllama | 4 hours ago
* Megaspeed was evading US sanctions against China
* Megaspeed CEO was a Chinese state agent
* Huang was sleeping with Megaspeed CEO
Therefore, one of the following must be true:
(1) [Unlikely] Huang knowingly supported the evasion of sanctions. If so, he should be fired for breaking the law.
(2) Huang was tricked. If so, his judgement is now suspect.
Huang's argument is (2). In this case, the evalaution of his judgement is:
(A) Is this a one-off mistake? If so, he should be retained - he's human.
(B) Is this a pattern? If so, he should be fired - he's an ongoing risk (e.g., via regulatory action).
Huang resigned because the second affair indicated (B) - he's an ongoing risk.
As a result, the question of "who knew what when" is actually beside the point. Retaining Huang risks ongoing, overwhelming government action for evading sanctions - and the board members want 0 personal liability in that investigation.
ergocoder | 3 hours ago
I used to work at a company where the sanction was around something mundane like Excel or something, and we had to make it an urgent priority to ban all users from Russia to access ... spinning the wheel ... our spreadsheet functionality.
My co-workers and I found it funny that US decided to ban Russia from using an online Excel-like functionality.
jcheng | 2 hours ago
Uhhrrr | 2 hours ago
make3 | an hour ago
The idea that he would somehow not know that they mostly end up in China is ridiculous to me. That guy must be connected up the wazu
heisenbit | 57 minutes ago
monk_grilla | 48 minutes ago
bluegatty | 22 minutes ago
(1) [Unlikely] Huang knowingly supported the evasion of sanctions. If so, he should be fired for breaking the law.
(2) Huang was tricked. If so, his judgement is now suspect.""
No - it's absolutely not a choice between those two things and neither are likely.
A company bought some chips from Nvidia - and illegally moved some to China.
That's it.
Jenson knows many of Nvidias customers. Probably thousands.
He's not 'tricked' because he doesn't have some magical 'judge of character' - the insinuation is preposterous.
--> Companies do illegal stuff all the timee; this one was skirting export laws.
That's it.
He's not a mind reader, and she's probably not a spy either, I'm sure she told the CCP some things because that's how it works in China, just as US citizens tell US gov a lot of things as well.
Ultimately he bears some responsibility, and there's enough concern to look into it, but this is Occam's Razor - the lady was back door shipping gear, just as thousands of business do.
Just as more than 50% of the materials in Russian cruise missiles are 'made in USA' - and illegal 'smuggled' into Russia, and by 'smuggled' I mean sent in the regular mail.
nemo44x | 3 hours ago
my002 | 5 hours ago
motionlessveloc | 4 hours ago
luckydata | 4 hours ago
motionlessveloc | 4 hours ago
voganmother42 | 4 hours ago
SubjectToChange | 4 hours ago
linuxftw | 4 hours ago
dcrazy | 4 hours ago
Tadpole9181 | 4 hours ago
luckydata | 4 hours ago
CurrentB | 4 hours ago
SubjectToChange | 4 hours ago
riskable | 3 hours ago
A multi-billion dollar deal in Singapore would absolutely require some folks to physically go out there and do some inventory at the very least. It needs to be in the realm of, "We walked the data center and counted how many of our products were installed and we were shown their yet-installed inventory" documentation. "It matches what we sold them." A great big, fancy report. With pictures.
How much would that cost? Basically nothing compared to how much trouble they could get in for not doing that due diligence. Compare how much it would've cost against how much their stock just dropped.
nemo44x | 3 hours ago
nozzlegear | 41 minutes ago
I expect them to follow the law, which, in this case, appears to be a bit more complex than "you can't sell to china but it's okay if you sell to someone else who sells to china."
Not to mention the fact that he was sleeping with the Megaspeed exec makes it all extremely suspicious.
madaxe_again | 52 minutes ago
ergocoder | 4 hours ago
Because the woman he has an affair with happens to run a shell company that funnels chips to China and skirts the export ban. What a coincidence, huh?
I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that.
mywittyname | 30 minutes ago
Everyone involved has to be CYAing. It's pretty likely that a whole boatload of people were involved and none of them want to be the scapegoat that gets to go to jail for it. If they can sell this as something as simple as Jensen getting tricked by a cute spy, then everyone involved can sleep easy and Jensen will probably keep controlling things behind the scenes for a while.
deadnomore | 19 minutes ago
bar8uyr | 3 hours ago
uncivilized | 3 hours ago
aucisson_masque | an hour ago
dogscatstrees | 20 minutes ago
simplesocieties | 18 minutes ago
Caloric3002Swed | 5 hours ago
luisgvv | 5 hours ago
Create a charity, move to a rural town and become a farmer?
xbeta | 5 hours ago
dopamean | 4 hours ago
xbeta | 3 hours ago
informal007 | 5 hours ago
Avlin67 | 5 hours ago
ederamen | 4 hours ago
lestertomlin | 4 hours ago
zachwills | 4 hours ago
itvision | 4 hours ago
One thing is clear: his extramarital affairs are not the reason why he did it.
There is something extremely important we don't yet know and may never know.
tescreal | 4 hours ago
tl;dr - how much of this might be motivated about internal politics and board views vs. CEO views ?
hollow-moe | 4 hours ago
gradascent | 4 hours ago
mirmor23 | 4 hours ago
On a more mundane level, since he can neither go to office, nor to the house, any guesses what his routine will be over next couple weeks? Not a perfect example, but for some reason, this reminds me of the last scene in Fargo where WH Macy gets holed up in a motel buying time.
rationalist | 4 hours ago
Not if people with agendas keep squashing it. They don't even have to be sophisticated agendas - just look at the comments in this thread.
thraway3837 | 4 hours ago
latentsea | 4 hours ago
OhMeadhbh | 4 hours ago
I honestly have no feelings one way or another about this.
mtlmtlmtlmtl | 4 hours ago
This stuff has probably been going on behind the scenes for a while. The leak about the affair is just the catalyst that accelerated it all.
xyst | 4 hours ago
I’ll believe it when I see it. In the wake of the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis, a single low level executive was prosecuted during the whole ordeal.
mcmcmc | 4 hours ago
NetMageSCW | 2 hours ago
mcmcmc | 2 hours ago
shye | an hour ago
rolosa | an hour ago
bottlepalm | 3 hours ago
China just needed her to sleep with Jensen, so they could get him fired. Nvidia is at a loss without him. Knock Nvidia down a peg.
If China wanted more Nvidia GPUs you really think sexy spy was their strategy? You think China is upset right now they lost their sexy spy? No, this went all according to plan for China - Jensen is gone, and a weaker Nvidia remains.
This is like Apple losing Jobs. The company remains, but the vision is gone.
meowlamoon | 2 hours ago
It might just as well come as a big surprise to them how much chaos an incompetent board can bring that far exceeds a spy's capability.
bottlepalm | 2 hours ago
unwise-exe | 2 hours ago
Sleeping with subordinates exposes the company to risk from employment-related lawsuits. He'd be in just as much trouble if he'd done that while single.
xyst | 4 hours ago
ElijahLynn | 4 hours ago
prts | 4 hours ago
747-8I | 4 hours ago
itsthecourier | 4 hours ago
Jepsen survived in an industry of failures, he is an incredibly talented CEO
lyton | 4 hours ago
nnm | 4 hours ago
win311fwg | 4 hours ago
sp4cec0wb0y | 4 hours ago
rappatic | 3 hours ago
nnm | 3 hours ago
U.S. officials believe that China’s intelligence services recruited Alice Huang as an asset because of her access to the chip-designer chief
-----
Read between the lines: "believe", we do not have any real evidences, but we believe.
Alice might have to interact with someone from Chinese government ---> that's evidence of being recruited as spy.
Let's forget about the fact that anyone who do business in China (or any country) needs to interact with government employees at some time point.
nnm | 3 hours ago
OK, looks like this spy story was not power enough (as we do not have evidence), let's use another one: an internal affair. Maybe two lies will do the job.
adamqureshi | 4 hours ago
tasty_freeze | 3 hours ago
tencentshill | 3 hours ago
wewewedxfgdf | 3 hours ago
orbital-decay | 3 hours ago
737min | 3 hours ago
barelysapient | 3 hours ago
Seriously who cares?
Its not like Nvidia is going away.
smashah | 3 hours ago
amelius | 3 hours ago
user_7832 | 3 hours ago
I genuinely am struggling to understand why the board would remove him unless there's more they know that we don't.
slim | 3 hours ago
caidan | 3 hours ago
entropicabyss | 3 hours ago
suthakamal | 3 hours ago
irishloop | 3 hours ago
"Oh who cares who he slept with, he's been great for Nvidia. Nothing has been proven."
He's one of the most visible CEO's in the most visible industry in the world, and the entire AI economy is dependent upon them. The perception of him as stable is incredibly important.
Merely the suggestion that he is having affairs with people with close ties to China's government, given export controls, is a huge PR problem. Adding in an additional affair with someone under him. And the likelihood that there may be even more out there.
I doubt the Board wants to get rid of Jensen Huang. He's done incredibly well for them. But right now, there's a huge PR shitstorm swirling around the company.
Maybe in six months it all dies down and he comes back, who knows. But right now, you really can't just ignore the problem and hope the media doesn't care about the whole "well she was only sort of a spy" situation.
romanovcode | 2 hours ago
What a load of crap. Elon Musk is deranged and nobody bats an eye. Zuck is proven to steal and sell data illegally for political gains in authoritative countries with Cambridge analytica and nobody cares. This guy has 2 affairs and is out.
dcrazy | 2 hours ago
runeblaze | an hour ago
computably | an hour ago
AndrewKemendo | an hour ago
Jensen was the sober boring AI leader everyone could count on
When perception of that changes then “the market” will re price
Ancalagon | an hour ago
My theory is the rest of the oligarchy was getting scared of NVIDIA's stranglehold on AI development and the broader economy and felt they needed to knock Huang and the company down a peg or two. Maybe install a bit of a crony CEO (a la Tim Apple).
NoPicklez | an hour ago
Musk also has significant voting rights as opposed to Huang. Musk is also part of a company that does weird, wacky and wild things, Huang isn't.
Nvidia is seen as a massively stable company with a respected CEO. That's what has been eroded.
gscott | an hour ago
lz400 | 16 minutes ago
m4rtink | 2 hours ago
polarsanel | an hour ago
With the recent midterm / AI crash, I'll leave this stock well alone. Might buy at sub 100 if panic sets in.
bottlepalm | 59 minutes ago
China won big with this one.
madaxe_again | 50 minutes ago
taikon | 14 minutes ago
awepofiwaop | 50 minutes ago
The CEO's personality is irrelevant if they're selling something that's in high enough demand. Money matters more than anything.
This particular scandal is an issue for Nvidia because:
1. Actual espionage, national security, etc. is potentially in play - criminal charges cost money.
2. Liability from potential lawsuits around in-office affairs - civil suits cost money.
solyin | 19 minutes ago
mgaunard | 2 hours ago
Welcome to corporate America.
aizk | 2 hours ago
commandersaki | 2 hours ago
chasd00 | 2 hours ago
https://www.reuters.com/technology/former-nvidia-ceo-huang-h...
maerF0x0 | an hour ago
aucisson_masque | an hour ago
When you are the first person to call the ceo a sexual opportunist, you take all the risks. When you’re second third, it’s easier, you’re just one more person.
rolosa | an hour ago
joebig | 2 hours ago
Sentiment cloud of this discussion.
AnimeLife | 2 hours ago
MadrasTh0rn | an hour ago
https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2026/11/12/xi-jinping-say...
raadxa09 | an hour ago
nntwozz | an hour ago
— Senator Judson Ross in Species II (1998)
(Played by James Cromwell)
Words to live by.
jasondigitized | an hour ago
ak681443 | an hour ago
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jensen-huang-nvidia-rejects-ai-...
Could this be it? Are these fuckers worried about their incentives being misaligned where Anthropic would love to stop open weight models in the US and NVIDIA has incentives to beat Apple at the local AI game.
Just asking questions oh and Dey took'er jerbs!!!
bharathreddy497 | an hour ago
LightBug1 | an hour ago
wanderingmind | an hour ago
bdamm | an hour ago
smnplk | an hour ago
Ofcourse he might have to pay a few bill to men and women sitting in oversized leather club chairs to avoid prosecution.
internet2000 | an hour ago
stefangordon | an hour ago
iltennico | 51 minutes ago
largbae | 45 minutes ago
Perhaps some influential folks want to support Anthropic's IPO by showing that the open source models will soon be blunted/outlawed, but IPO-ing into a crash seems like a high price for that moat.
Or do similarly influential folks want to tank AI as a whole but couldn't politically afford a crash before mid-terms?
rampatra | 37 minutes ago
Makes me think, life’s so fragile. Jensen put 30+ years into the company and this is how it ends, hopefully not, but still sad.
anon291 | 32 minutes ago