ReportWire

Tag: NVIDIA

  • Gen AI saves FIs hours by generating equities reports

    [ad_1]

    The financial services industry is deploying generative AI throughout operations and investment banking is realizing high returns. 

    Agentic AI can enhance operations across all financial institutions including: 

    • Private equity shops; and 

    Chip giant Nvidia, for one, has seen a sharp rise in the use of its agentic AI model application among financial services firms and is working to provide more computing power to drive adoption across the industry, Kevin Levitt, who leads global business development for financial services at the company, told Bank Automation News.

    agentic
    (AI-generated)

    Financial services is a leading vertical at Nvidia, Levitt said.  

    “FIs have a long track record of adopting and integrating new technology. … They know how to integrate these new technologies into their functions and to find returns on them.” 

    AI agents assist analysts 

    One of the most successful gen AI use cases within financial services has been assisting analysts at investment houses generate equities reports, Levitt said.  

    “They’re using these [AI] agents to cover specific equities and update research reports on those stocks,” Levitt said. “The agents can handle 10 times the previous volume of documents than a human could, and they’re actually extracting information with greater accuracy.” 

    One investment house that Levitt did not identify reported that it has “reduced the report generation time from 40 hours down to 15 minutes,” he said. “That’s a 160X improvement.” 

    Higher order tasks left for humans 

    Chris Ackerson, senior vice president of product at AI-driven tech provider AlphaSense, agrees. He also told BAN that many financial institutions are using gen AI-driven assistants to help junior bankers write PowerPoint decks and reports. 

    AlphaSense’s gen AI tool scans the internet, including for specific information such as SEC filings, to find pertinent information for the analyst’s report, he said. 

    “Traditionally it would have taken many hours or maybe even days to find the right information and synthesize it,” Ackerson said. But with gen AI “that [process] can be automated and analysts can focus on higher order tasks.” 

    The tool is multidimensional, allowing it to be used to conduct due diligence for M&A activities, another time-consuming activity for FIs, he said. 

    Nearly 80% of the world’s top asset management firms use AlphaSense’s AI-driven solution, including Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley, Ackerson said. 

    Check out our exclusive new bank industry data here. 

    [ad_2]

    Vaidik Trivedi

    Source link

  • Sam Altman’s AI paradox: Warning of a bubble while raising trillions

    [ad_1]

    Welcome to Eye on AI! AI reporter Sharon Goldman here, filling in for Jeremy Kahn. In this edition… Sam Altman’s AI paradox…AI has quietly become a fixture of advertising…Silicon Valley’s AI deals are creating zombie startups…sources say Nvidia working on new AI chip for China that outperforms the H20.

    I was not invited to Sam Altman’s cozy dinner with reporters in San Francisco last week (whomp whomp), but maybe that’s for the best. I have trouble suppressing exasperated eye rolls when I hear peak Silicon Valley–ironic statements.

    I am not sure I could have controlled myself when the OpenAI CEO said that he believes AI could be in a “bubble,” with market conditions similar to the 1990s dotcom boom. Yes, he reportedly said, “investors as a whole are overexcited about AI.” 

    Yet, over the same meal, Altman also apparently said he expects OpenAI to spend trillions of dollars on its data center buildout in the “not very distant future,” adding that “you should expect a bunch of economists wringing their hands, saying, ‘This is so crazy, it’s so reckless,’ and we’ll just be like, ‘You know what? Let us do our thing.’”

    Ummm…what could be more frothy than pitching a multi-trillion-dollar expansion in an industry you’ve just called a bubble? Cue an eye roll reaching the top of my head. Sure, Altman may have been referring to smaller AI startups with sky-high valuations and little to no revenue, but still, the irony is rich. It’s particularly notable given the weak GPT-5 rollout earlier this month, which was supposed to mark a leap forward but instead left many disappointed with its routing system and lack of breakthrough progress.

    In addition, even as Altman speaks of bubbles, OpenAI itself is raising record sums. In early August, OpenAI secured a whopping $8.3 billion in new funding at a $300 billion valuation—part of its plan to raise $40 billion this year. That figure was five times oversubscribed. On top of that, employees are now poised to sell about $6 billion in shares to investors like SoftBank, Dragoneer, and Thrive, pushing the company’s valuation potentially up to $500 billion.

    OpenAI is hardly an outlier in its infrastructure binge. Tech giants are pouring unprecedented sums into AI buildouts in 2025: Microsoft alone plans to spend $80 billion on AI data centers this fiscal year, while Meta is projecting up to $72 billion in AI and infrastructure investments. And on the fundraising front, OpenAI has company too — rivals like Anthropic are chasing multibillion-dollar rounds of their own. 

    Wall Street’s biggest bulls, like Wedbush’s Dan Ives, seem unconcerned. Ives said Monday on CNBC’s “Closing Bell” that demand for AI infrastructure has grown 30% to 40% in the last months, calling the capex surge a validation moment for the sector. While he acknowledged “some froth” in parts of the market, he said the AI revolution with autonomous systems is only starting to play out and we are in the “second inning of a nine-inning game.” 

    And while a bubble implies an eventual bursting, and all the damage that results, the underlying phenomenon causing a bubble often has real value. The advent of the web in the ’90s was revolutionary; The bubble was a reflection of the massive opportunities opening up.

    Still, I’d be curious if anyone pressed Altman on the AI paradox—warning of a bubble while simultaneously bragging about OpenAI’s massive fundraising and spending. Perhaps over a glass of bubbly and a sugary sweet dessert? I’d also love to know if he fielded tougher questions on the other big issues looming over the company: its shift to a public benefit corporation (and what that means for the nonprofit), the current state of its Microsoft partnership, and whether its mission of “AGI to benefit all of humanity” still holds now that Altman himself has said AGI “is not a super-useful term.”

    In any case, I’m game for a follow-up chat with Altman & Co (call me!). I’ll bring the bubbly, pop the questions, and do my best to keep the eye rolls at bay.

    Also: In just a few weeks, I will be headed to Park City, Utah, to participate in our annual Brainstorm Tech conference at the Montage Deer Valley! Space is limited, so if you’re interested in joining me, register here. I highly recommend: There’s a fantastic lineup of speakers, including Ashley Kramer, chief revenue officer of OpenAI; John Furner, president and CEO of Walmart U.S.; Tony Xu, founder and CEO of DoorDash; and many, many more!

    With that, here’s more AI news.

    Sharon Goldman
    sharon.goldman@fortune.com
    @sharongoldman

    FORTUNE ON AI

    Wall Street isn’t worried about an AI bubble. Sam Altman is – by Beatrice Nolan

    MIT report: 95% of generative AI pilots at companies are failing – by Sheryl Estrada

    Silicon Valley talent keeps getting recycled, so this CEO uses a ‘moneyball’ approach for uncovering hidden AI geniuses in the new era – by Sydney Lake

    Waymo experimenting with generative AI, but exec says LiDAR and radar sensors important to self-driving safety ‘under all conditions’ – by Jessica Matthews

    AI IN THE NEWS

    More shakeups for Meta AI. The New York Times reported today that Meta is expected to announce that it will split its A.I. division — which is known as Meta Superintelligence Labs — into four groups. One will focus on AI research; one on  “superintelligence”; another on products; and one on infrastructure such as data centers. According to the article’s anonymous sources, the reorganization “is likely to be the final one for some time,” with moves “aimed at better organizing Meta so it can get to its goal of superintelligence and develop AI products more quickly to compete with others.” The news comes less than two months after CEO Mark Zuckerberg overhauled Meta’s entire AI organization, including bringing on Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang as chief AI officer. 

    Madison Avenue is starting to love AI. According to the New York Times, artificial intelligence has quietly become a fixture of advertising. What felt novel when Coca-Cola released an AI-generated holiday ad last year is now mainstream: nearly 90% of big-budget marketers are already using—or planning to use—generative AI in video ads. From hyper-realistic backdrops to synthetic voice-overs, the technology is slashing costs and production times, opening TV spots to smaller businesses for the first time. Companies like Shuttlerock and ITV are helping brands replace weeks of work with hours, while tech giants like Meta and TikTok push their own AI ad tools. The shift raises ethical questions about displacing creatives and fooling viewers, but industry leaders say the genie is out of the bottle: AI isn’t just streamlining ad production—it’s reshaping the entire commercial playbook.

    Silicon Valley’s AI deals are creating zombie startups: ‘You hollowed out the organization.’ According to CNBC, Silicon Valley’s AI startup scene is being hollowed out as Big Tech sidesteps antitrust rules with a new playbook: licensing deals and talent raids that gut promising young companies. Windsurf, once in talks to be acquired by OpenAI, collapsed into turmoil after its founders bolted to Google in a $2.4 billion licensing pact; interim CEO Jeff Wang described tearful all-hands meetings as employees realized they’d been left with “nothing.” Similar moves have seen Meta sink $14.3 billion into Scale AI, Microsoft scoop up Inflection’s founders, and Amazon strip talent from Adept and Covariant—leaving behind so-called “zombie companies” with little future. While founders and top researchers cash out, investors and rank-and-file staff are often left stranded, sparking growing concern that these quasi-acquisitions not only skirt regulators but also threaten to choke off AI innovation at its source.

    Nvidia working on new AI chip for China that outperforms the H20, sources say. According to Reuters, Nvidia is developing a new China-specific AI chip, codenamed B30A, based on its cutting-edge Blackwell architecture. The chip, which could be delivered to Chinese clients for testing as soon as next month, would be more powerful than the current H20 but still fall below U.S. export thresholds—using a single-die design with about half the raw computing power of Nvidia’s flagship B300. The move comes after President Trump signaled possible approval for scaled-down chip sales to China, though regulatory approval is uncertain amid bipartisan concerns in Washington over giving Beijing access to advanced AI hardware. Nvidia argues that retaining Chinese buyers is crucial to prevent defections to domestic rivals like Huawei, even as Chinese regulators cast suspicion on the company’s products.

    EYE ON AI RESEARCH

    Study finds AI-led interviews improved outcomes. A new study looked at what happens when job interviews are run by AI voice agents instead of human recruiters. In a large experiment with 70,000 applicants, people were randomly assigned to be interviewed by a person, by an AI, or given the choice. Surprisingly, AI-led interviews actually improved outcomes: applicants interviewed by AI were 12% more likely to get job offers, 18% more likely to start jobs, and 17% more likely to still be employed after 30 days. Most applicants didn’t mind the change—78% even chose the AI when given the option, especially those with lower test scores. The AI also pulled out more useful information from candidates, leading recruiters to rate those interviews higher. Overall, the study shows that AI interviewers can perform just as well as, or even better than, human recruiters—without hurting applicant satisfaction.

    AI CALENDAR

    Sept. 8-10: Fortune Brainstorm Tech, Park City, Utah. Apply to attend here.

    Oct. 6-10: World AI Week, Amsterdam

    Oct. 21-22: TedAI San Francisco. Apply to attend here.

    Dec. 2-7: NeurIPS, San Diego

    Dec. 8-9: Fortune Brainstorm AI San Francisco. Apply to attend here.

    BRAIN FOOD

    Do AI chatbots need to be protected from harm? 

    AI lab Anthropic has introduced a new safety measure in its latest Claude models, which empowers the AI to terminate conversations in extreme cases of harmful or abusive interaction. The feature activates only after repeated redirections fail—typically for content requests involving sexual exploitation of minors or facilitation of large-scale violence. The company is notably framing this as a safeguard not principally for users, but for the model’s own “AI welfare,” reflecting an exploratory stance on the machine’s potential moral status.

    Unsurprisingly, the idea of granting AI moral status is contentious. Jonathan Birch, a philosophy professor at the London School of Economics, told The Guardian he welcomed Anthropic’s move for sparking a public debate about AI sentience—a topic he said many in the industry would rather suppress. At the same time, he warned that the decision risks misleading users into believing the chatbot is more real than it is.

    Others argue that focusing on AI welfare distracts from urgent human concerns. For example, while Claude is designed to end only the most extreme abusive conversations, it will not intervene in cases of imminent self-harm—even though a New York Times opinion piece yesterday urged such safeguards, written by a mother who discovered her daughter’s ChatGPT conversations only after her daughter’s suicide.

    [ad_2]

    Sharon Goldman

    Source link

  • Video: What to Know About Trump’s Deal With A.I. Chipmakers

    [ad_1]

    new video loaded: What to Know About Trump’s Deal With A.I. Chipmakers

    By Tripp Mickle, Karen Hanley, Jon Hazell and David Jouppi•

    Nvidia and AMD will give the Trump administration a cut of chip sales to China in a deal that raises questions about national security and trade policy goals. Tripp Mickle explains.

    Recent episodes in Behind the Reporting

    [ad_2]

    Tripp Mickle, Karen Hanley, Jon Hazell and David Jouppi

    Source link

  • Nvidia, AMD to pay U.S. government 15% of China AI chip sales in an unusual export agreement

    [ad_1]

    U.S. chipmakers Nvidia and AMD will pay the U.S. government 15% of revenue generated by sales of their AI chips in China, a White House official confirmed to CBS News. 

    The Financial Times on Sunday reported that the agreement between the tech giants and the U.S. government was reached as a condition for granting export licenses for China, which were provided last week. A U.S. official confirmed the “broad strokes” of the report to CBS News.

    The arrangement, with companies providing a stream of revenue in exchange for export licenses, is highly unusual as corporations typically do not pay the federal government a share of revenue from their export sales. Export licenses also do not carry any fees, according to shipping giant Maersk.

    In a Monday press conference, President Trump described the agreement with Nvidia as a deal that would benefit the nation. He described meeting with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to discuss the terms of agreeing to the export license; Mr. Trump didn’t mention AMD in his comments.

    “So I said, ‘I want 20% if I’m going to approve it for you,’” Mr. Trump said of his meeting with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to discuss the terms of the export license. “I don’t want it myself, so when I say I want 20%, it’s for the country.”

    “[Huang] said, ‘Will you make it 15%?’ so we negotiated a little deal,” the president added. 

    The revenue-sharing plan comes after the White House announced in April that it would restrict sales of Nvidia’s H20 chips and MI308 chips from rival chipmaker AMD to China. However, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang last month said it had won approval from the Trump administration to sell its H20 chips to China.

    The H20 chip, which is specialized for artificial intelligence applications, was developed by Nvidia for the Chinese market, while AMD’s MI308 chips are also geared for AI. 

    It is unclear how the Trump administration would use the money generated from the chip sales agreement. 

    Nvidia declined to comment on the specifics of the deal. In a statement, a spokesperson said, “We follow rules the U.S. government sets for our participation in worldwide markets. While we haven’t shipped H20 to China for months, we hope export control rules will let America compete in China and worldwide.”

    AMD did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Stocks for both companies rose slightly on Monday.

    Proponents of restrictions on sales of advanced chips to China say they are necessary to ensure the U.S. maintains a competitive edge as the two countries battle for AI dominance. They’ve also been viewed as a security safeguard. In one instance during the Biden administration, the Commerce Department said it was updating its export controls and said advanced AI capabilities “present U.S. national security concerns.”

    “These controls were strategically crafted to address, among other concerns, the PRC’s efforts to obtain semiconductor manufacturing equipment essential to producing advanced integrated circuits needed for the next generation of advanced weapon systems,” the department said in a 2023 release.

    The Associated Press

    contributed to this report.

    Mary Cunningham

    Mary Cunningham is a reporter for CBS MoneyWatch. Before joining the business and finance vertical, she worked at “60 Minutes,” CBSNews.com and CBS News 24/7 as part of the CBS News Associate Program.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Inside look: BNY’s Nvidia-built AI factory

    [ad_1]

    BNY has tapped Nvidia to build an AI factory to increase its computational power and deploy gen AI more efficiently within its operations.  Nvidia AI factories are a set of graphic processing units (GPUs) embedded with Nvidia software that can be customized for each organization to run gen AI models efficiently, Malcolm deMayo, global vice […]

    [ad_2]

    Vaidik Trivedi

    Source link

  • Should You Buy Nvidia Stock Before Nov. 20? The Evidence Is Piling Up, and Here’s What It Suggests.

    Should You Buy Nvidia Stock Before Nov. 20? The Evidence Is Piling Up, and Here’s What It Suggests.

    [ad_1]

    The adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) is continuing at a brisk pace, but some are waiting for the other shoe to drop. A strengthening U.S. economy and robust quarterly results from several AI-related companies helped push the Nasdaq Composite to a new record high last week. Yet these same factors have some investors wondering if the bull market has gone too far, too fast.

    Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) has become the de facto standard bearer for the generative AI industry. The company is scheduled to report its fiscal 2025 third-quarter results in less than three weeks, and it’s not an exaggeration to suggest that Wall Street is on pins and needles waiting for the clues that report will offer about the state of AI adoption. Nvidia’s sales have surged since the start of last year, driving the stock up 833% (as of this writing). It’s also less than 5% off the all-time high it touched late last month.

    Start Your Mornings Smarter! Wake up with Breakfast news in your inbox every market day. Sign Up For Free »

    There’s a lot riding on Nvidia’s upcoming financial report, and many shareholders are wondering whether the stock can possibly continue its breathtaking run. Is it worth picking up shares ahead of its financial report on Nov. 20? Fortunately for investors, data has begun to pile up that could help answer that question.

    Image source: Getty Images.

    The key to Nvidia’s astounding successes of the past couple of years has been the performance of its graphics processing units (GPUs), which are the best chips for supplying the specific type of computational horsepower necessary for generative AI, as well as other types of cloud computing needs. The necessary resources and the sheer magnitude of data involved limit the top-tier AI models to the world’s largest technology companies and cloud providers — most of which are Nvidia customers. Comments made in conjunction with those tech giants’ recent quarterly results provide some insights about the state of the AI revolution — and the evidence is clear.

    For example, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) said it spent heavily to advance its AI agenda in its fiscal 2025 first quarter (which ended Sept. 30). The company had capital expenditures (capex) of $20 billion, which primarily went to support “cloud and AI-related” demand. CFO Amy Hood expects Microsoft’s spending spree to continue: “We expect capital expenditures to increase on a sequential basis given our cloud and AI demand signals,” she said.

    During Alphabet‘s (NASDAQ: GOOGL) (NASDAQ: GOOG) third-quarter earnings call, CEO Sundar Pichai said, “Realizing [the opportunity] of AI requires … meaningful capital investment.” The company revealed capex of $13 billion during the quarter and suggested there would be “substantial increases in capital investment … going into 2025.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia Set to Replace Intel in the Dow Jones Industrial Average

    Nvidia Set to Replace Intel in the Dow Jones Industrial Average

    [ad_1]

    (Bloomberg) — Nvidia Corp., the chipmaker at the heart of the artificial intelligence boom, is joining the oldest of Wall Street’s three main equity benchmarks.

    Most Read from Bloomberg

    The company will replace rival Intel Corp. in the 128-year-old Dow Jones Industrial Average prior to the start of trading on Nov. 8, S&P Dow Jones Indices said in a statement late Friday. Sherwin-Williams Co. is also joining, replacing Dow Inc.

    The addition of Nvidia to the blue-chip index is a testament to the power of the AI-driven rally that’s pushed the chipmaker up 900% in the past 24 months. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was the only major US equity benchmark that didn’t hold Nvidia — until now.

    “Nvidia is a well-run company and joining the Dow demonstrates just how powerful its rally has been in recent years after it was at the right place at the right time when no one else was,” said Scott Colyer, chief executive at Advisors Asset Management.

    The Santa Clara, California-based company has been the poster child of the euphoria surrounding AI and the biggest driver of stock market gains. The chipmaker ended the week with a market value of $3.32 trillion, about $50 billion shy of Apple Inc. Shares were up 3.2% in post-market trading, putting Nvidia in a position to dethrone Apple as the world’s most valuable company as soon as Monday if the gains hold.

    Intel joined the gauge in November 1999 when it was added along with Microsoft Corp., SBC Communications and Home Depot Inc. Once the industry leader in computer processors, Intel has been recently struggling under a turnaround plan. The company has slashed spending in 2024, cut jobs and suspended investor payouts. Shares have lost 54% this year, and sank another 2% after the bell.

    “Intel has lagged in a huge way,” said Adam Sarhan, founder of 50 Park Investments. “Now, the Dow is evolving. You don’t want to see stocks that were there 30 years ago. You want to see what’s the strongest that survive today.”

    Midland, Michigan-based Dow Inc. has been in the blue-chip index since 2019, when it was spun off by former parent DowDuPont.

    The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which first started as an index of 12 industrial stocks that included General Electric Co., has faced criticism for being a much narrower equities gauge than the S&P 500 Index or the Nasdaq 100 and lacking technology stocks that have dominated markets in recent years.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Transactions from Money20/20: Citi, Google Cloud expand AI and cloud strategy

    Transactions from Money20/20: Citi, Google Cloud expand AI and cloud strategy

    [ad_1]

    Citi is expanding its use of Google Cloud to access the cloud provider’s generative AI capabilities.  Rohit Bhat, general manager and managing director at Google Cloud’s financial services, told Bank Automation News at Money20/20 this week that the $1.6 trillion bank will also look to Google Cloud for: Modernization of its tech stack;  Data analytics […]

    [ad_2]

    Vaidik Trivedi

    Source link

  • The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Market Size Could Reach $826 Billion by 2030. Here Are 2 Companies That Are AI Stars.

    The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Market Size Could Reach $826 Billion by 2030. Here Are 2 Companies That Are AI Stars.

    [ad_1]

    As incredible a year as 2024 has been for Artificial Intelligence (AI) stocks, it’s entirely possible that 2025 could be even better. There is still a lot of momentum and plenty of positive catalysts are on the horizon that can spur more growth. This is a market that most major players believe will be massive. Analysis from Statista puts the market at $826 billion by 2030.

    So, as we approach the end of the year, what companies are poised to see serious growth? While I don’t have a crystal ball, here are my top two picks.

    Yes, Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) still has room to run. The semiconductor giant is gearing up for another big year driven primarily by sales of the soon-to-be-released “Blackwell” architecture, the newest iteration of its flagship AI-powering chips.

    A lot will be revealed in the company’s upcoming earnings next month and the guidance the company sets, but it seems that 2025 could see a significant jump in revenue as demand continues to be sky-high for its current “Hopper” chips despite Blackwell’s imminent release. The reported 12-month-long backlog for Blackwell orders should keep it so. Elon Musk, for instance, recently purchased 100,000 H100s — there is more than one version of each iteration of chip architecture — and plans on purchasing another 50,000 H200s soon.

    Nvidia’s competitors are struggling to keep pace and I don’t see them materially eating into Nvidia’s market share in 2025. AMD is set to release its next-generation AI chip around the same time Blackwell finally ships. Here’s the catch: It will be a direct competitor of the H200, not the (Blackwell) B200. AMD is a full cycle behind at this point. This will likely narrow, but Nvidia has a lot of cash to fuel its pace of innovation that AMD can’t match. Last quarter, despite playing catch up, it spent about half of what Nvidia spent on research and development.

    Take a look at this chart, which shows the massive amount of free cash flow (FCF) Nvidia has at its disposal to maintain its edge. Of course, money isn’t everything, but it sure helps.

    NVDA Free Cash Flow Chart

    Meta (NASDAQ: META) has received a lot of flack in recent years because of Mark Zuckerberg’s insistence that the metaverse is going to be the next big thing. It doesn’t seem like he’s right about this one — the company’s metaverse division, Reality Labs, posted a $4.5 billion loss last quarter.

    But I don’t think this is quite the folly that many do; the metaverse still could be big. The reason I bring this up, though, is that it shows Meta isn’t afraid to take risks and bet big. Zuckerberg is applying the same attitude to AI, investing heavily in building out its Meta AI and eventually incorporating that technology into the work Reality Labs does.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia Stock Could Soar Another 38%, According to 1 Wall Street Firm

    Nvidia Stock Could Soar Another 38%, According to 1 Wall Street Firm

    [ad_1]

    Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) has been in scintillating form on the stock market in 2024, reaching gains of nearly 180% as of this writing. This is due to the robust growth that the company has been clocking in recent quarters on account of the strong demand for its graphics cards deployed in artificial intelligence (AI) servers.

    The stock’s median 12-month price target of $150 — as per 64 analysts who cover Nvidia — indicates that there isn’t much upside on offer as it points toward gains of just 9% from current levels. However, Bank of America recently raised their price target on Nvidia from $165 to $190, which would translate into a 38% gain from current levels.

    Let’s see why that was the case and check if this high-flying semiconductor stock could rise above consensus estimates and deliver stronger gains going forward.

    Bank of America analysts have raised their price target on Nvidia because of the company’s dominant position in the AI chip market. They believe that the chipmaker could continue commanding an estimated 80% to 85% share of this space, which puts the company in a terrific position to capitalize on a $400 billion market opportunity.

    Bank of America’s bullishness also stems from the arrival of Nvidia’s new generation of Blackwell processors, as well as a terrific earnings report from key supplier TSMC and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s claim that the demand for its upcoming Blackwell cards is “insane.” It is worth noting that Nvidia management pointed out on the company’s August earnings-conference call that it is on track to sell several billion dollars’ worth of Blackwell processors in the fourth quarter of the current fiscal year.

    More importantly, the demand for Blackwell chips is expected to be higher than their supply in 2025. That won’t be surprising as multiple cloud-computing giants are in line to deploy Nvidia’s Blackwell processors. In March this year, Nvidia management pointed out that Amazon Web Services, Dell Technologies, Google, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, Oracle, Tesla, and xAI are among the many companies expected to adopt the Blackwell platform.

    That’s not surprising considering the huge leap in performance that Nvidia’s Blackwell platform is expected to deliver as compared to the prior-generation Hopper chips. More specifically, Nvidia is promising a 4 times increase in AI training performance and a 30 times jump in AI inference as compared to Hopper. Even better, Nvidia claims that Blackwell can train large language models (LLMs) at “up to 25x less cost and energy consumption than its predecessor.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: Blackwell AI Chip Design Flaw Fixed | Entrepreneur

    Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: Blackwell AI Chip Design Flaw Fixed | Entrepreneur

    [ad_1]

    Nvidia’s Blackwell AI chip, the same one that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said had “insane” demand, is now free of a design error that caused a production delay.

    According to a Wednesday Reuters report, Huang said that the design mistake “was 100% Nvidia’s fault.”

    “We had a design flaw in Blackwell,” he stated. “It was functional, but the design flaw caused the yield to be low.”

    He specified the nature of the problem, stating that “in order to make a Blackwell computer work, seven different types of chips were designed from scratch and had to be ramped into production at the same time.” After fixing the design flaw, Nvidia has been producing Blackwell “at an incredible pace,” Huang said.

    Related: Here’s Why Nvidia Just Broke Another Record and Could Take Apple’s Crown as the Most Valuable Company in the World

    The chips were supposed to ship in the second quarter of this year, but are now shipping in the fourth quarter.

    Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang displays a Blackwell chip. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images

    Reports that Blackwell could be delayed ramped up in August, causing Nvidia shares to drop. Since then, the stock has climbed back up, growing over 188% year-to-date at the time of writing.

    Related: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Says Nuclear Energy ‘Is a Wonderful Way Forward’ to Keep AI Data Centers Running

    Huang has previously said that intense demand was the one thing that kept him up at night and that everyone wanted to be the first to use the Blackwell chip.

    “We have a lot of people on our shoulders, and everybody is counting on us,” he said last month.

    Snags in Blackwell production affect some of the world’s biggest tech companies, which are Nvidia’s biggest customers. Over 40% of Nvidia’s revenue comes from just four clients: Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft.

    Related: Here’s How the CEOs of Salesforce and Nvidia Use ChatGPT in Their Daily Lives

    [ad_2]

    Sherin Shibu

    Source link

  • TSMC Hikes Revenue Outlook in Show of Confidence in AI Boom

    TSMC Hikes Revenue Outlook in Show of Confidence in AI Boom

    [ad_1]

    (Bloomberg) — Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. raised its target for 2024 revenue growth after quarterly results beat estimates, allaying concerns about global chip demand and the sustainability of an AI hardware boom.

    Most Read from Bloomberg

    The main chipmaker to Nvidia Corp. and Apple Inc. now expects sales to climb about 30% in US dollar terms this year, up from previous projections for about a mid-20% rise. That’s after TSMC reported better-than-predicted earnings for the September quarter. And it foresees capital expenditure rising in 2025 from roughly $30 billion this year.

    TSMC’s outlook should help tamp down concerns that investors mis-judged the AI and semiconductor demand. Those fears crystallized after chip industry linchpin ASML Holding NV stunned markets by reporting about half the orders investors had expected. On Thursday, Chief Executive Officer C. C. Wei sought to dispel those doubts. Shares of the company trading on Tradegate gained 7.4% versus their last close on the German exchange.

    Shares of Japanese chip gear makers including Lasertec Corp. pared losses in Tokyo, while Infineon Technologies AG rose in Europe alongside sector peers.

    “The demand is real and I believe it’s just the beginning,” Wei said, echoing a number of executives including Nvidia Corp.’s CEO. In terms of overall chip demand, “everything’s stabilized and start to improve.”

    TSMC’s shares have surged more than 70% this year, outpacing many of Asia’s biggest tech firms in a reflection of strong sales of the Nvidia chips vital to artificial intelligence development.

    For a liveblog on TSMC’s earnings, click here.

    Taiwan’s largest company had raised its outlook for 2024 revenue just a few months ago in July, underscoring expectations for spending on AI infrastructure from the likes of Microsoft Corp. and Amazon.com Inc. Steady adoption of artificial intelligence should also help fuel sales of iPhones and other gadgets in the long run.

    Still, investors had watched for deviations in TSMC’s outlook after ASML blamed slower-than-expected recovery in the automotive, mobile and PC markets, impacting expansion plans for chip plants. AI remains a bright spot, its executives said.

    On Thursday, TSMC reported a better-than-projected 54% rise in September-quarter net profit to NT$325.3 billion ($10.1 billion). And it expects revenue of $26.1 billion to $26.9 billion in the final quarter, beating an estimate for $24.9 billion.

    While official trading of the company’s American depositary receipts won’t begin for a while, the ADRs were up about 4.5% on Robinhood’s overnight trading platform. TSMC is popular among US retail investors seeking to bet on the AI theme.

    What Bloomberg Intelligence Says

    TSMC’s guidance of a 57%+ gross margin, which surpasses consensus, coupled with a fast ramp-up of N3 nodes, indicating continuous robust high-performance computing chips, like AI training chip, production demand from Nvidia and others. This aligns with our expectations. Sales growth should be able to exceed 25% in 2025, supported by strong AI chip demand and TSMC’s leadership in 3- and 5-nm nodes, alongside advanced CoWoS packaging.

    – Charles Shum, analyst

    Click here for the research.

    The world’s largest maker of advanced chips has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of a global race to develop artificial intelligence. Its shares have more than doubled since that boom took off in late 2022 with the debut of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. TSMC’s market capitalization briefly crossed the $1 trillion mark in the US.

    Yet even before ASML, some investors have grown cautious about the trajectory of global AI spending. They question whether big tech firms like Meta Platforms Inc. and Alphabet Inc. will continue to splash out on AI chips and data centers without a truly killer AI application.

    The risks of data center over-capacity and geopolitical issues have unnerved some investors. Bloomberg reported this week that Biden administration officials have discussed capping sales of advanced AI chips from Nvidia and other American companies on a country-specific basis.

    On Thursday, Wei said he expects revenue from AI server processors to more than triple this year, yielding a mid-teens percentage of total sales in 2024.

    Longer-term, TSMC is pursuing a rapid international expansion.

    It’s planning more plants in Europe with a focus on the market for artificial intelligence chips, according to a senior Taiwanese official. That’s on top of construction underway in Japan, Arizona and Germany.

    –With assistance from Vlad Savov, Cindy Wang, Mayumi Negishi and Lianting Tu.

    (Updates with shares and executives’ comments from the fourth paragraph.)

    Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

    ©2024 Bloomberg L.P.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Nvidia’s ‘Insane’ AI Chip Demand Leads to Record Share Price | Entrepreneur

    Nvidia’s ‘Insane’ AI Chip Demand Leads to Record Share Price | Entrepreneur

    [ad_1]

    Nvidia is the second most valuable company in the world, with a market cap of over $3 trillion. At market close on Monday, shares of the AI chipmaker hit an unprecedented high of $138.07 before falling to $131.32 at the time of writing.

    Nvidia’s performance is tied to strong demand for its AI chips. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang stated recently that demand for Nvidia’s Blackwell AI chip is “insane” and “everybody wants to have the most.” Nvidia expects to ship enough of the new chip to make several billion dollars.

    Nvidia was briefly on the edge of unseating Apple as the most valuable company in the world on Monday. Last week, Nvidia shares grew by $400 billion in five days, more than the entire market cap of Costco.

    Related: Employees Who Worked at This Company for the Past 5 Years Are Now Multi-Millionaires in ‘Semi-Retirement’

    Huang also said last month that demand was his biggest worry, or what kept him up at night.

    “We have a lot of people on our shoulders, and everybody is counting on us,” he said, adding that having access to Nvidia’s technology was a “really emotional” point for the company’s clients.

    Nvidia counts the biggest tech players among its clients: Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Google contribute to more than 40% of its revenue. Nvidia’s earnings beat analyst expectations last quarter, with revenue growing 122% year-over-year, the fourth quarter in a row of growth over 100%.

    Related: Nvidia’s Profits More Than Doubled, but Traders Are Still ‘Shrugging.’ Here’s Why According to a Market Expert.

    [ad_2]

    Sherin Shibu

    Source link

  • This Could Be the Next Big Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Split. Here’s Why You Should Buy It Before It Happens.

    This Could Be the Next Big Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Split. Here’s Why You Should Buy It Before It Happens.

    [ad_1]

    The biggest winners in the stock market over the last two years have all been great companies fueling the biggest innovations in artificial intelligence (AI).

    Nvidia is the poster child of big AI stock winners. Its GPUs are essential equipment for training and running large language models. It has seen its stock climb 865% over the last 24 months, leading to a 10-for-1 stock split in June.

    Nvidia was far from the only AI-fueled stock to split shares this year. It was joined by Broadcom, Super Micro Computer, and Lam Research, which all executed splits.

    A stock split isn’t necessarily a catalyst for a stock to zoom higher. The fundamental value of a company doesn’t change when management decides to split its shares. And in today’s age of fractional shares, it only has a minor impact on making the stock more accessible to small investors.

    But a stock split is a sign of confidence from management that shares will continue to climb, and few people have more insights into the future of a company and its stock than management.

    So, investors are rightly interested in what could be the next stock to undergo a split. One company essential to the supply of AI semiconductors looks like a great candidate: ASML Holding (NASDAQ: ASML). And at today’s share price, investors should be looking to buy the stock before it announces a split.

    A graphic displaying a machine printing a silicon wafer.

    An ASML machine printing a chip. Image source: ASML.

    An essential part of the supply chain

    ASML builds and services photolithography machines, which semiconductor manufacturing companies use to produce the chips designed by companies like Nvidia. Basically, without ASML’s machines, there are no AI chips.

    It’s the only supplier of extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machinery, a necessary technology for printing the most advanced chips, such as those used in AI data centers for training and running large language models. If a manufacturer is printing a high-end semiconductor, it’s using ASML’s machines.

    Customers include Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, Intel, and Samsung. All three revamped their foundries about a decade ago to accommodate ASML’s machinery.

    But the company isn’t reliant on selling more machines every year to fuel revenue growth. It receives ongoing revenue from servicing machines already in use and selling replacement parts. The recurring revenue from servicing should grow as more machines are installed in chipmakers’ foundries.

    ASML’s revenue from its installed base has grown significantly faster than its system sales over the last 15 years as foundries add more of its equipment to their operations while maintaining and updating old equipment. And given the long lifespans of ASML’s machines (25 to 30 years), that’s a steady and growing source of high-margin revenue.

    Newer machines using the latest EUV technology will go into service next year. And the increased complexity of the high-end machines could result in even greater revenue from service and replacement parts relative to older machines.

    The future looks bright

    ASML referred to 2024 as a transition year. It doesn’t expect any revenue growth, and it forecasts gross margin contraction this year as it gears up to sell its latest EUV machines.

    That stands in stark contrast to a company like Nvidia, which has seen revenue and profits continue to soar in 2024. So it’s no wonder investors haven’t been nearly as excited about ASML as they are about big-name chipmakers.

    But that could be an opportunity for patient long-term investors. ASML expects 2025 to be a big year. Management’s outlook calls for between 30 billion and 40 billion euros ($33.17 billion to $44.2 billion) in revenue next year as foundry openings using its newest machines go into service. At its midpoint, that represents a 27% increase from 2023.

    At its investor day in 2022, management provided an outlook for sales in 2030 of between $48.65 billion and $66.34 billion. Considering that was before the AI boom really took off, it’s a good bet that revenue will come in on the high end. Management might update that outlook to a higher or narrower range at its next investor day in November.

    Along with sales growth, management expects strong margin expansion. It sees gross margins between 54% and 56% in 2025 and 56% and 60% by 2030. And while it hasn’t explicitly forecast operating margin expansion, it should see good operating leverage from its research-and-development and selling, general, and administrative expenses as its revenue scales up toward the $66 billion mark.

    All of that should translate into very strong profit growth. And considering the technology lead and relationships ASML already has with the largest foundries in the world, there shouldn’t be much standing in the way of achieving those numbers.

    Will this be the next big stock split?

    ASML currently trades around $835 per share. While that’s well off its all-time high of around $1,100, it’s still quite a lofty price. Stocks have split with far lower prices.

    The company last executed forward splits in the late 1990s and the year 2000 amid the dot-com boom. With a strong outlook based on the ongoing spending to build the next generation of AI chips, ASML could be motivated to split its shares in the near future as it sees significant growth ahead.

    Even without a stock split, you should consider adding shares to your portfolio. The stock currently trades around 26 times forward earnings expectations. Given the potential for strong and predictable revenue increases and margin expansion for years to come, the company should be able to produce earnings growth that more than justifies that slight premium to the overall S&P 500. And when you compare ASML’s price to other AI stocks, it’s an absolute bargain.

    Should you invest $1,000 in ASML right now?

    Before you buy stock in ASML, consider this:

    The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and ASML wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

    Consider when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005… if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $765,523!*

    Stock Advisor provides investors with an easy-to-follow blueprint for success, including guidance on building a portfolio, regular updates from analysts, and two new stock picks each month. The Stock Advisor service has more than quadrupled the return of S&P 500 since 2002*.

    See the 10 stocks »

    *Stock Advisor returns as of September 30, 2024

    Adam Levy has positions in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends ASML, Lam Research, Nvidia, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing. The Motley Fool recommends Broadcom and Intel and recommends the following options: short November 2024 $24 calls on Intel. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

    This Could Be the Next Big Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Split. Here’s Why You Should Buy It Before It Happens. was originally published by The Motley Fool

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Jobs report stokes Wall Street rally that erases the week’s earlier losses

    Jobs report stokes Wall Street rally that erases the week’s earlier losses

    [ad_1]

    Wall Street soared Friday on news that employers are still hiring in strong numbers, recovering from slumps caused by fears that escalating Middle East tensions could impact global energy supply.

    • S&P 500: 5,751.07 ⬆️ up 0.90%
    • Nasdaq Composite: 18,137.85 ⬆️ up 1.22%
    • Dow Jones Industrial Average: 42,352.75 ⬆️ up 0.81% 
    • STOXX Europe 600: 518.56 ⬆️ up 0.44%
    • Hang Seng Index: 22,736.87 ⬆️ up 2.82%
    • Nikkei 225: 38,635.62 ⬆️ up 0.22%
    • Bitcoin: $62,336.70 ⬆️ up 2.62%

    US: Wall Street gains on stellar jobs report
    US employers added 254,000 jobs in September, surpassing estimates and signaling continued economic strength. The S&P 500 closed up 0.90%, and the Dow neared its record, up 0.81%. Meanwhile, the tech-heavy Nasdaq climbed 1.22% with big gains for Nvidia, Broadcom Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices.

    The news erased losses from earlier in the week, as S&P 500 finished with a 0.22% weekly gain, while the Dow added 0.09%, and the Nasdaq ticked up 0.1%.

    Europe: US jobs report lifts markets abroad
    Europe markets were mixed in early trading but gained on the U.S. jobs report. The Stoxx Europe 600 closed up 0.44% and the U.K.’s FTSE made up for losses early in the day, hovering near its Thursday close.

    China: Hong Kong rally resumes after holiday
    Hong Kong shares resumed their rally on the back of China’s stimulus measures, jumping 2.82% a day after traders took profits following a three-week rise of some 30%.

    Japan: Markets end week near where they started
    The Nikkei 225 ended a yo-yo week with a slight 0.22% gain after new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba outlined his economic agenda, which includes above-inflation pay raises and assistance for low-income households.

    [ad_2]

    Brooke Seipel

    Source link

  • Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: Demand For Blackwell AI Is Insane | Entrepreneur

    Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: Demand For Blackwell AI Is Insane | Entrepreneur

    [ad_1]

    In May, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said that “the next industrial revolution has begun,” and AI will drive “significant productivity gains.” It looks like he’s right — industry demand for Nvidia’s next-generation AI chip, Blackwell, is through the roof.

    “Blackwell is in full production, Blackwell is as planned, and the demand for Blackwell is insane,” Huang told CNBC on Thursday. “Everybody wants to have the most, and everybody wants to be first.”

    Related: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s Biggest Worry Shows that Success Has a Downside

    Nvidia first announced Blackwell in March and stated that it was the most powerful AI chip in the world with advanced security capabilities, better performance, and more memory. The biggest names in AI, including OpenAI, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, and Google, will use Blackwell to power their AI efforts.

    Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang displays the new Blackwell GPU chip, left, and the Hopper GPU chip, right, in March 2024. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images

    “There is currently nothing better than NVIDIA hardware for AI,” Tesla and xAI CEO Elon Musk stated, at the time.

    Since the initial announcement, Blackwell has hit a few snags in production, leading to delays. Nvidia CFO Colette Kress said in late August that the company has fixed the issue and expects to ship “several billion dollars” worth of the chip in the fourth quarter of 2024.

    Related: Nvidia’s Immense Market Power Is Worrying Investors — Here’s Why

    The chip costs between $30,000 to $40,000 and took $10 billion to develop.

    Huang said that Nvidia has updated its platform significantly with Blackwell, and intends to continue updating it. Nvidia has increased performance by two to three times from its 2022 Hopper chip to its Blackwell chip, which Huang says increases revenue for Nvidia’s customers by two to three times.

    “What we’re looking at now is the beginning of the next wave of AI, the biggest wave of AI,” Huang told CNBC. “This is really about companies around the world using AI to be more productive as their digital employees and AI agents and co-pilots and however people describe them, as well as using AI, generative AI, to revolutionize the way they build their products and the products they build.”

    Huang said last month that intense demand for Nvidia’s technology and software keeps him up at night. On Wednesday, Nvidia partnered with Accenture to train 30,000 of Accenture’s employees on Nvidia’s technology.

    Related: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Says Nuclear Energy ‘Is a Wonderful Way Forward’ to Keep AI Data Centers Running

    [ad_2]

    Sherin Shibu

    Source link

  • Throne And Liberty Is Steam’s Latest Massive Free Hit: Here’s What You Need To Know

    Throne And Liberty Is Steam’s Latest Massive Free Hit: Here’s What You Need To Know

    [ad_1]

    After multiple delays and name changes, Throne and Liberty has finally been released, offering us a new MMO in a time of drought. The genre has waned in popularity, and can often seem overshadowed by more standard live service titles, but Throne and Liberty aims to shake things up with creative class design, gorgeous visuals, and an engrossing progression experience. Here’s what you need to know about this new MMO on the block.

    The Week In Games: Octopath Dreamland Deluxe

    What is Throne and Liberty?

    Throne and Liberty is a Korean MMO developed by NCSOFT and published by Amazon Games. Set in the open world of Solisium, what was once intended to be a sequel to Lineage has now become a unique property, although maintains the fantasy setting.

    It provides PVE fans with a sweeping tale that sees you leveling up, taking on dungeons, and working through a series of intense quests as you seek to face off against a potentially world-ending threat.

    If the PVE adventure isn’t enough for you, however, Throne and Liberty is also a very guild-focused MMO with a heavy emphasis on PVP. So if you want to see everything the game has to offer, you’ll be able to join a guild and work together to take on contracts and defeat other players in both massive and small-scale battles.

    Throne and Liberty offers a tab-targeting combat system and abides by the holy trinity of design: tank, healer, and DPS—roles that are required to overcome its most challenging dungeons and encounters. Despite sticking closely to that familiar formula, Throne and Liberty shakes things up a bit by offering a shocking amount of freedom in how you can approach classes.

    How does Throne and Liberty handle classes?

    Screenshot: NCSoft

    Unlike the average MMO, this game allows you to mix and match two main weapons to create any combination of your choosing. Do you want to wield a greatsword and a staff to become a badass battlemage? Cool! Go nuts slamming foes with your sword between casting fire and ice spells. Do you want to be a ranged DPS that can also heal? Combine the wand and tome with a longbow and unleash a flurry of arrows between casting restorative spells on you and your teammates.

    While there are certainly meta combinations that allow for the very best stats for high-end PVE and PVP content, you never have to feel as if your off-meta pick will leave you out of the best parts of the game, as every combination can be a powerhouse in the right hands. Just choose what is most fun to you and go wild.

    Is Throne and Liberty free-to-play?

    Like many modern MMOs, Throne and Liberty has adopted a free-to-play (F2P) model. This means you can download the game for free on your chosen platform and play it forever without paying any type of subscription.

    However, the game’s F2P design means that NCSOFT has implemented battle passes that can be purchased with real money, as well as an in-game shop where players can buy cosmetics, like outfits and transformations, and leveling passes that drastically improve the leveling experience that would otherwise require you to grind.

    With this in mind, some may consider the game pay-to-win (P2W), but it’s not quite as egregious as similar titles. All of the gear and items can be obtained in the game simply by playing, but players who wish to speed up gear acquisition can do so. It’s still possible to move through the process at a reasonable speed without feeling like the game is punishing you too severely for not breaking out a credit card.

    What platforms is Throne and Liberty on?

    Throne and Liberty is available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and PC. Due to the fairly high system requirements of the game, it’s unlikely we’ll ever see it make an appearance on the Nintendo Switch.

    Does Throne and Liberty have cross-play?

    Now THIS is some cross play.

    Screenshot: NCSoft

    Yes, Throne and Liberty offers cross-play. This means you can absolutely play with friends across various platforms. For instance, if you’re on PS5 and have friends on PC, you’ll be able to link up with them in-game with no hiccups.

    That being said, you’ll need to be on the same server to play together, so you’ll still want to sync up with your pals before you drop in to be certain you don’t end up having to payreal money on a server transfer.

    Will my PC run Throne and Liberty?

    Throne and Liberty is a gorgeous game that is no doubt graphically a step above the average MMO. If you’re on PC, you may be wondering if the game will run properly with your current configuration.

    Here are the minimum PC specs:

    • Intel Core I5-6500
    • NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 4GB
    • 8GB RAM
    • Windows 10
    • DirectX 12

    Here are the recommended specs according to Can You Run It:

    • Intel Core i5-11600k
    • NVIDIA Geforce GTX 1660
    • 16GB RAM
    • Windows 10 (64-bit)
    • DirectX 12

    Here’s to hoping your rig is up to the job!

    For more on what’s happening in the world of MMOs, check out how ridiculous the price a pet hippo has become in Final Fantasy XIV.

    .

    [ad_2]

    Billy Givens

    Source link

  • What Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told the founder of this Google rival after investing in his startup

    What Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told the founder of this Google rival after investing in his startup

    [ad_1]

    Listen and subscribe to Opening Bid on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

    Hungry upstarts don’t always get the attention of major players, but in the case of You.com, founder Richard Socher got a front-row seat with Nvidia’s Jensen Huang.

    “I was extremely impressed with Jensen,” Socher told Yahoo Finance executive editor Brian Sozzi on his Opening Bid podcast (above video; listen in here).

    His AI-powered search engine recently announced a $50 million Series B round with investors including Nvidia (NVDA), Salesforce (CRM) Ventures, and DuckDuckGo. The capital raise valued the Google (GOOG) and Yahoo rival at close to $1 billion.

    Socher said he met with Huang for nearly two hours around the time of the investment, discussing topics ranging from history to running a business.

    “I don’t generally get nervous with most people, but it was very impressive to hear him giving advice,” Socher said.

    During his conversation, Socher says Huang shared that “he focused a lot on the speed of Nvidia” during its early years.

    Eventually, Nvidia opted to pivot a little to gain focus.

    “At some point, they realized that the best way is to focus on gaming first and really dominate that niche,” Socher said, adding that Huang suggested staying focused on You.com’s mission of being an AI-powered alternative to Google.

    This isn’t the first time Socher and Nvidia have crossed paths.

    In the early 2010s, his research group at Stanford utilized Nvidia GPUs. At that time, Nvidia mostly sold GPU products to the graphics sector. “Nvidia was like, ‘who are you? Why are you trying to buy our GPUs,’” said Socher, noting that GPUs now assist with the company’s AI workloads.

    Nvidia launched in 1993 — born from Huang’s scribbling on a napkin at a Denny’s — to develop 3D graphics for gaming and multimedia purposes. Back then, an increasing number of consumers were taking the computing plunge, leading to demand for higher-powered computers.

    Six years later, Nvidia introduced graphics processing units (GPU), and in 2012, it brought AI to the forefront by introducing the AlexNet neural network.

    This summer, Nvidia introduced an initiative that would bring generative AI to a wider audience using its latest GPU technology. The company’s AI chips are seen as having a wide performance lead over rivals AMD (AMD) and Intel (INTC), leading to impressive financial results over the past two years.

    Nvidia’s second quarter sales and earnings rose 122% and 152%, respectively, from the prior year.

    After a summer pullback following mixed third quarter guidance, Nvidia is now the third most valuable company in the world. It sports a market cap of $2.98 trillion, while Microsoft sits at $3.18 trillion and Apple stands at $3.46 trillion, according to Yahoo Finance’s comparison tool.

    Year-to-date, shares are up 145% compared to an 18% gain for the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite.

    Three times each week, Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi fields insight-filled conversations and chats with the biggest names in business and markets on Opening Bid. You can find more episodes on our video hub or watch on your preferred streaming service.

    Click here for the latest technology news that will impact the stock market

    Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • OpenAI’s Leadership Exodus: 9 Key Execs Who Left the A.I. Giant This Year

    OpenAI’s Leadership Exodus: 9 Key Execs Who Left the A.I. Giant This Year

    [ad_1]

    Mira Murati, Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman and Andrej Karpathy (clockwise, starting at top left). Photos by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images, JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images, Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images and Michael Macor/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

    Since ChatGPT took the world by storm in late 2022, OpenAI’s revenue and market value have skyrocketed. But internally, the company hasn’t necessarily had the smoothest ride. The A.I. giant, valued at $150 billion, lost a slew of top executives this year. On Wednesday (Sept. 25) alone, a trio of leaders, including chief technology officer Mira Murati, chief research officer Bob McGrew, and VP of research Barret Zoph, all announced their departures. They join a larger group of former OpenAI employees who have left for rival A.I. developers and startups. As of now, CEO Sam Altman is one of only two active remaining members of the company’s original 11-person founding team.

    OpenAI hasn’t just lost employees—it has also rehired some familiar faces. In May, OpenAI welcomed back Kyle Kosic, who worked at the company between 2021 and 2023 on its technical staff. Kosic left last year to join Elon Musk’s xAI. Several other outgoing OpenAI employees have taken similar routes and gone on to work for competing A.I. companies, showing just how competitive the industry is at the moment.

    Here’s a look at some of the top leaders OpenAI has lost in 2024 thus far:

    Andrej Karpathy, research scientist

    Andrej Karpathy has left OpenAI not once but twice. One of OpenAI’s 11 founders, Karpathy helped build the company’s team on computer vision, generative modeling and reinforcement learning. He first departed in 2017 to lead Tesla’s Autopilot effort. Returning to OpenAI in 2023, Karpathy left once again in February this year to focus on “personal projects.” He subsequently established Eureka Labs, an A.I. education startup.

    Ilya Sutskever, chief scientist and co-head of the super alignment team

    A renowned machine learning researcher, Ilya Sutskever helped co-found OpenAI nearly a decade ago and served as the company’s chief scientist. He was also notably a member of the four-person board that temporarily ousted Altman last year before reinstating him. Sutskever, who was subsequently removed from the board, later said he regretted his involvement in the brief ouster. In May, he announced his departure from OpenAI and said he was leaving for a venture that is “very personally meaningful.”

    This project was revealed to be Safe Superintelligence, a startup focused on developing a safe form of artificial general intelligence (AGI), a type of A.I. that can think and learn on par with humans. Earlier this month, the company was valued at $5 billion after raising $1 billion from investors, including Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia Capital.

    Jan Leike, co-head of the super alignment team

    Just days after Sutskever left, OpenAI executive Jan Leike announced his resignation as well. Sutskever and Leike co-ran the company’s safety team, which has since been disbanded. Leike said he decided to leave in part due to disagreements with OpenAI leadership “about the company’s core priorities,” citing a lack of focus on safety processes around developing AGI. Leike has since taken up a new role as head of alignment science at Anthropic, an OpenAI rival founded by former OpenAI employees Dario Amodei and Daniela Amodei.

    John Schulman, head of alignment science

    John Schulman, another OpenAI co-founder, made significant contributions to the creation of ChatGPT. After Leike’s departure, Schulman became head of OpenAI’s alignment science efforts and was appointed to its new safety committee in May. That’s why Schulman’s decision in August to step away from the company came as a surprise—especially when he revealed that he would be joining Anthropic. “This choice stems from my desire to deepen my focus on A.I. alignment and to start a new chapter of my career where I can return to hands-on technical work,” said Schulman on X, where he also clarified that his decision to step away from OpenAI wasn’t connected to a lack of support for alignment research.

    Peter Deng, vice president of consumer product

    Peter Deng, a top OpenAI product executive, also decided to step away from the company earlier this year. Having first joined OpenAI last year, he ended his tenure as vice president of product in July, according to his LinkedIn. Deng, who also previously held product leader positions at companies like Uber (UBER) and Meta (META), has not publicly revealed his next steps.

    Greg Brockman, president

    Greg Brockman, often seen as Altman’s right-hand man, hasn’t technically left the company but is instead taking a sabbatical through the end of 2024. In August, he announced his time off and described it as the “first time to relax since co-founding OpenAI nine years ago.” Brockman started off as OpenAI’s chief technology officer before becoming the company’s president in 2022. He indicated that he plans to return to OpenAI, noting that “the mission is far from complete; we still have a safe AGI to build.”

    Mira Murati, chief technology officer

    Mira Murati, one of OpenAI’s most public-facing figures, resigned earlier this week after more than six years with the company. “I’m stepping away because I want to create the time and space to do my own exploration,” said Murati, who notably served as interim CEO during Altman’s brief ousting last year, on X. Adding that she will “still be rooting” for OpenAI, Murati said her primary focus currently is “doing everything in my power to ensure a smooth transition, maintaining the momentum we’ve built.” Altman praised her leadership in a statement on X, describing Murati as instrumental to OpenAI’s “development from an unknown research lab to an important company.”

    Bob McGrew, chief research officer

    Shortly after Murati’s resignation, Bob McGrew, OpenAI’s chief research officer, also announced plans to leave the company. He simply said on X, “It is time for me to take a break.” Having previously worked at PayPal (PYPL) and Palantir, McGrew started off as a member of OpenAI’s technical staff and has been serving as OpenAI’s chief research officer since August.

    Barret Zoph, vice president of research

    Barret Zoph is the third executive who announced his resignation this week. Like his two colleagues, Zoph said it’s a “personal decision based on how I want to evolve the next phase of my career.” Zoph, a former research scientist at Google (GOOGL), joined OpenAI in 2022 and played a large role in overseeing OpenAI’s post-training team.

    Murati, McGrew and Zoph made their decisions independently of each other, according to Altman, but decided to depart simultaneously “so that we can work together for a smooth handover to the next generation of leadership.” The CEO conceded that, while the abruptness of the leadership changes isn’t the most natural, “we are not a normal company.”

    OpenAI’s Leadership Exodus: 9 Key Execs Who Left the A.I. Giant This Year

    [ad_2]

    Alexandra Tremayne-Pengelly

    Source link

  • 1 Unstoppable Stock That Could Join Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta in the $1 Trillion Club

    1 Unstoppable Stock That Could Join Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta in the $1 Trillion Club

    [ad_1]

    The U.S. economy has a history of producing the world’s most valuable companies. United States Steel became the first-ever $1 billion company in 1901, and 117 years later, Apple became the first company in the world to surpass a $1 trillion valuation.

    Apple is now worth over $3 trillion, but since 2018, tech giants Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta Platforms, and Alphabet have joined it in the trillion-dollar club. But I think yet another is on track to join them.

    Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) was founded in 1977 and has since participated in nearly every technological revolution. Right now, it’s quickly becoming a leader in artificial intelligence (AI) data center infrastructure, which could be the company’s ticket to a $1 trillion valuation.

    Based on Oracle’s current market cap of $429 billion, investors who buy its stock today could earn a gain of 133% if it gets there.

    A leader in AI infrastructure

    Large language models (LLMs) are at the foundation of every AI software application. They are trained by ingesting mountains of data, and from there, the model identifies patterns and learns to make predictions. Typically, the “smartest” AI applications are powered by the LLMs with the most data, and the training process is facilitated by centralized data centers filled with graphics processing units (GPUs).

    Nvidia supplies the world’s most powerful GPUs for developing AI models. Simply put, the more GPUs a developer can access, the more data they can feed into an LLM, and the faster it can be processed. The Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Supercluster technology allows developers to scale up to more than 32,000 Nvidia GPUs (and soon, over 65,000), which is more than any other data center provider.

    Plus, the company’s random direct memory access (RDMA) networking technology moves data from one point to another more quickly than traditional Ethernet networks. Since developers often pay for computing capacity by the minute, OCI is among the fastest and cheapest solutions for training LLMs. That’s why AI leaders like OpenAI, Cohere, and Elon Musk’s xAI are now using Oracle.

    Oracle chairman Larry Ellison says the company currently has 85 live data centers, with 77 under construction. However, he estimates the company will eventually have somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000, so it has barely scratched the surface of its opportunity so far.

    Automation is one thing that sets Oracle apart from other data center operators. No matter its size, every Oracle data center is identical in terms of functionality, so the company is able to manage them all with software alone — no humans required. Not only is that a big cost savings for the end-user, but it also creates a more secure service by eliminating human error. Plus, automation is the key to scaling up Oracle’s data center locations into the thousands.

    Two people talking while walking past servers inside a data center.

    Image source: Getty Images.

    Oracle’s data center revenue is surging

    Oracle generated $13.3 billion in total revenue during the fiscal 2025 first quarter (ended Aug. 31), a 7% increase from the year-ago period. The OCI segment, specifically, delivered $2.2 billion in revenue, up by a whopping 46%.

    As in previous quarters, OCI revenue would have grown even faster during Q1 if the company had more data centers online. It currently has an enormous backlog of customers waiting for more computing capacity.

    That is reflected in Oracle’s remaining performance obligations, which came in at a record $99 billion during the quarter, up 52% year over year. That was an acceleration from the 44% growth the company achieved in the final quarter of fiscal 2024. Oracle signed 42 new deals for GPU capacity worth $3 billion during Q1 alone, contributing to the sharp increase in remaining performance obligations (RPOs).

    CEO Safra Catz believes 38% of the company’s RPOs (around $37.6 billion) will be converted to revenue over the next 12 months, which should help the company return to double-digit percentage growth at the top line. Additionally, she expects an acceleration in OCI growth compared to the previous fiscal year.

    Oracle’s (mathematical) path to the $1 trillion club

    Oracle has generated $3.88 in trailing-12-month earnings per share. So, based on its current stock price of $155.89, it trades at a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 40.2. The Nasdaq-100 technology index trades at a P/E ratio of 30.7, so Oracle stock certainly isn’t cheap when measured against its peers.

    However, Oracle’s trailing-12-month earnings grew by 15% compared to the prior period, and Wall Street is forecasting accelerated earnings growth of 24% for fiscal 2025 overall. That might explain why investors are now willing to pay a premium for its stock.

    Mathematically speaking, if Oracle’s P/E ratio remains constant, the company could achieve a $1 trillion valuation within the next 10 years, even if its earnings growth slows to just 8.8%. But that’s a very conservative estimate considering based on Ellison’s comments, it could grow its data center footprint tenfold over the long term. If that happens, Oracle’s earnings growth is likely to accelerate, not decelerate, in the coming decade.

    Remember, the company’s data centers rely on automation, so they offer incredible scalability. In other words, Oracle should experience an expanding gross profit margin as more data centers are built, which will be a huge tailwind for its earnings.

    As a result, I think Oracle has a great opportunity to join its big-tech peers in the $1 trillion club within the next decade.

    Should you invest $1,000 in Oracle right now?

    Before you buy stock in Oracle, consider this:

    The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and Oracle wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

    Consider when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005… if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $729,857!*

    Stock Advisor provides investors with an easy-to-follow blueprint for success, including guidance on building a portfolio, regular updates from analysts, and two new stock picks each month. The Stock Advisor service has more than quadrupled the return of S&P 500 since 2002*.

    See the 10 stocks »

    *Stock Advisor returns as of September 9, 2024

    John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Randi Zuckerberg, a former director of market development and spokeswoman for Facebook and sister to Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Anthony Di Pizio has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Oracle. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

    1 Unstoppable Stock That Could Join Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta in the $1 Trillion Club was originally published by The Motley Fool

    [ad_2]

    Source link