Shortly after the US stock market opened on Wednesday morning, Nvidia's stock price surged to $164.42. This pushed it briefly to a valuation of $4 trillion, a market value greater than the GDP of France, the UK, or India. 

The success at the Californian chip company has been helping the wider stock market recover after a downturn in April, partly prompted by US President Donald Trump announcing widespread tariffs. Trump's ongoing trade war sent global markets plummeting. 

Wall Street’s bet on AI

Nvidia, led by Taiwan-born Jensen Huang, has seen a consistent rise over the past two years as this enthusiasm over AI has boomed. 

Many big tech companies such as Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Meta, have also joined the multi-billion dollar AI race.

"The market has an incredible certainty that AI is the future," Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers told AFP news agency. "Nvidia is certainly the company most positioned to benefit from that gold rush." 

In early 2025, Nvidia and generative AI such as OpenAI were challenged by the arrival of China-based DeepSeek.

DeepSeek disrupted the AI world with a low-cost, high-performance model. Nvidia lost some $600 billion in market valuation in a single trading session at that time.

Nvidia weathers US tariffs

After Trump's tariffs hit the tech sector hard in April, Nvidia quickly bounced back. 

In the most recent quarter, Nvidia reported earnings of nearly $19 billion despite a $4.5 billion hit from US government export controls which limit chip sales to China.

In May, the company reached a deal to build AI infrastructure in Saudi Arabia, during a Trump state visit.

"We've seen the administration using Nvidia chips as a bargaining chip," said Angelo Zino, technology analyst at CFRA Research.

Even as Trump has announced new tariffs in recent days, US stocks have remained high, with the tech-centered Nasdaq closing at a new record on Wednesday.

Shares in Nvidia closed on Wednesday with a market value of $3.972 trillion.

Edited by: Elizabeth Schumacher