The crisis gripping Nvidia is gathering pace, with about $430bn (£322bn) wiped off the value of the world’s most valuable company since it was hit by a spying scandal.
Overnight, Nvidia announced it had hired a former top federal prosecutor to help investigate the chief executive Jensen Huang’s relationship with a suspected Chinese spy.
The company’s board have retained Joon H Kim, the former acting US Attorney of the southern district of New York, and his firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to conduct “a thorough and independent investigation”.
Wachtell is a heavyweight corporate law firm. In 2022 it was hired by Twitter to force Elon Musk to complete his $44bn takeover, for example, and has a track record of advising major companies on issues such as mergers and corporate governance.
It will now look into the circumstances of Huang’s affair – thought to be with Alice Huang, who worked for the Nvidia customer Megaspeed and who US officials believe is a Chinese spy.
Although Beijing has denied allegations that it operated an espionage operation targeting Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s value has been buffeted this week.
Yesterday its shares fell by almost 5.5%, adding to the 4.27% drop on Monday. This has pulled the company’s value down to $4.07tn, from $4.50tn before the story broke last weekend.
The allegations over Nvidia are testing relations between Washington and Beijing, according to the top US diplomat in China.
The ambassador David Perdue told Bloomberg Television: “The situation with Nvidia is another reminder that we have to stay diligent.
“National security is part of this economic conversation because economic security is national security. And so, what we’re doing with China is bumpy right now.”
Today’s key events
• 9.45am GMT: ECB president Christine Lagarde taking part on panel discussion at 9th Paris peace forum
• Noon GMT: US weekly mortgage approvals data
• 2.15pm GMT: chancellor John Healey quizzed by Treasury committee on the budget
We’ll be tracking all the main events throughout the day on our business live blog …
