Jensen Huang resigns as Nvidia CEO

The company did not give a reason for the departure in its announcement. Nvidia thanked Huang for his contributions over 33 years and said nothing further about the circumstances of the decision. The statement also did not address the allegations reported in recent days by The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times.

The announcement

The announcement was issued by Nvidia through GlobeNewswire on 12 November 2026 at 13:48 UTC under the heading "NVIDIA Announces CEO Transition". It stated that Huang had resigned from all three of his roles at the company: president, chief executive officer and director. The resignation took effect immediately upon announcement.

The board accepted the resignation on Wednesday, 11 November, according to a regulatory filing. The timing places the decision one day before the public announcement, and the filing provides the formal record of the board action. No further detail about the board deliberations has been disclosed.

Huang co-founded Nvidia in 1993 and led the company through its transformation from a graphics processor maker into the dominant supplier of the accelerators that power modern artificial intelligence systems. At 63 years of age, he remained the public face of the company and one of its largest individual shareholders. According to the most recent disclosures, Huang holds approximately 3.61 percent of Nvidia shares, which makes him the fourth-largest investor in the company.

Interim leadership

Colette Kress, the chief financial officer of Nvidia, has been appointed interim chief executive officer. Kress retains her role as chief financial officer while she serves in the interim position. The board has begun a search for a permanent successor and is considering internal and external candidates, according to the announcement.

Harvey C. Jones has been appointed chair of the board, the first person to hold the title of board chair in the history of the company. Jones is a former chief executive officer of Synopsys and has served as a member of the Nvidia board since 1993, the year the company was founded.

Jones said the board has "full confidence in Colette and the leadership team" and expects "operations, customer commitments and product roadmap to continue without interruption". The statement is the only substantive assurance the company has offered about continuity in the transition period.

Market reaction

Nvidia shares fell by more than 11 percent in premarket trading on Thursday, 12 November, according to TechCrunch. The shares closed at 173.73 United States dollars on Wednesday, 11 November. The decline extends a sharp slide that began earlier in the week: the company has lost more than 300 billion United States dollars in market value since Friday, and the share price now stands approximately 35 percent below its record close on 6 October 2026.

The scale of the market reaction reflects the centrality of Huang to the investment case for Nvidia. Under his leadership, the company became the most valuable supplier of the hardware on which the current generation of artificial intelligence models is trained and run. Investors now face a period of uncertainty about who will lead the company through the next phase of that market, and about whether the transition will affect product timing or customer relationships.

Background

Nvidia was founded in 1993 by Huang, Curtis Priem and Chris Malachowsky. The company first built its business on graphics processing units for personal computers and video games, and later found that the same parallel computing architecture was suited to the training of large artificial intelligence models. That second application drove a decade of growth that made Nvidia one of the most valuable companies in the world by market capitalisation.

Huang became known for his direct style of leadership and for his annual keynote presentations, in which he set out the company product roadmap in detail. His tenure is unusual in the technology industry for its length: 33 years as chief executive of a single company, from founding to resignation, is a record matched by few leaders of comparable companies.

Reported context

The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times have reported allegations concerning Huang in the days preceding the resignation. The details of those reports have not been confirmed by Nvidia, and the company statement gave no reason for the departure and did not address the allegations. Beijing has denied that Alice Huang is a spy, according to the reporting. Reuters has stated that it could not independently verify the allegations or the board plans described in the reporting. The allegations remain unproven claims in published reporting, and they should not be treated as established fact.

Why it matters

The resignation removes, with immediate effect, the chief executive who has directed Nvidia strategy since its founding. The company now enters a transition at a moment when demand for artificial intelligence accelerators is the central question in the technology industry, and when competitors are seeking to close the gap with Nvidia in hardware and software.

The appointment of an interim chief executive from within the existing leadership, and the appointment of a long-serving board member as chair, suggests that the board intends to signal stability. Jones has served on the board since 1993 and knows the company as well as any outside director can. Kress, as chief financial officer, has direct knowledge of the company financial position and of its customer commitments.

The market reaction, however, shows that investors are not yet satisfied that continuity is assured. A decline of more than 11 percent in premarket trading, following a loss of more than 300 billion United States dollars in market value since Friday, indicates that the market is pricing in a period of uncertainty about leadership, strategy and the timing of future products.

What happens next

Nvidia is scheduled to report results for the third quarter of fiscal year 2027 on Tuesday, 17 November. The results are expected at approximately 1:20 p.m. Pacific Time, with an earnings call at 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time. The report and the call will be the first formal opportunity for the interim leadership to address investors, and the market will watch closely for any statement about the search for a permanent chief executive, about the product roadmap and about customer demand.

The board search for a permanent successor is now the central question for the company. The announcement states that internal and external candidates are under consideration. No timetable for the appointment has been given.