Nvidia Crosses $40 Billion in AI Equity Bets This Year
CNBC reported Saturday that Nvidia has surpassed $40 billion in equity commitments so far in 2026. The chipmaker is systematically taking stakes in companies that form the AI infrastructure stack. Those same companies are, in many cases, also customers for Nvidia’s hardware.
New Deals Signal Accelerating Pace
This week Nvidia AI equity bets grew by more than $5 billion in back-to-back announcements. The company secured the right to invest up to $2.1 billion in data center operator IREN. A day earlier it reached a separate agreement to invest up to $3.2 billion in glassmaker Corning. Shares of both companies rose sharply following the news. Nvidia has now signed at least seven multibillion-dollar agreements with publicly traded firms since January. It has also participated in roughly two dozen private funding rounds, according to data cited by CNBC from FactSet.
Background: A Strategy That Accelerated in 2025
Nvidia’s move into direct investing gained serious momentum last year. The company’s largest single commitment remains a $30 billion investment in OpenAI. It also joined funding rounds for Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI before that company merged with SpaceX in February. CEO Jensen Huang explained the philosophy during an April podcast appearance. He said Nvidia tries to back every major foundation model company rather than selecting individual winners. Nvidia’s annual SEC filing disclosed $17.5 billion in private company and infrastructure fund investments during the last fiscal year alone. Those positions focused primarily on early-stage AI startups that purchase its products.
Critics Raise Circular Investment Concerns
Not everyone views the strategy as straightforwardly positive. Some analysts have drawn comparisons to the vendor financing practices that contributed to the dot-com bubble’s inflation. The concern centers on Nvidia backing companies that buy its chips, then leasing computing capacity back to some of those same firms. Wedbush Securities analyst Matthew Bryson acknowledged the tension directly. He wrote in a note that the deals fit what he called a “circular investment theme” driving durability fears in the broader market. Bryson still sees the approach as potentially building a durable competitive moat, provided Nvidia can execute effectively. Nvidia generated approximately $97 billion in free cash flow in its most recent fiscal year, giving it ample firepower to continue at this pace. Shareholders will receive a fuller accounting of the portfolio’s scale when the company reports fiscal first-quarter earnings in roughly two weeks.
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