Days after overtaking Apple as the second most valuable company, AI chipmaker giant Nvidia has officially dethroned tech giant Microsoft, earlier the world’s most valuable company.

According to reports, on Tuesday, Nvidia’s shares rose to around $135 by 3.5 per cent, elevating its market capitalization (market cap) to $3.34 trillion. Microsoft and Apple follow closely behind with their market cap being around $3.32 trillion and $3.286 trillion respectively.

This year alone, the company’s shares rose by around 173 per cent as opposed to Microsoft’s 19 per cent increase. In February 2024, Nvidia’s market value expanded from $1 trillion to $2 trillion in less than a year. The company also witnessed a roughly three-fold surge in revenue that quarter. It took the chipmaker less than five months to reach the $3 trillion mark in June.

The company had anticipated hefty demand for its data center chips and Graphic Processing Units (GPUs) which only grew as other firms scrambled to expand their AI offerings. In 2023, Nvidia became the most profitable semiconductor firm, surpassing Intel, Samsung, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). Currently, Nvidia’s silicon dominates the global market for AI chips with customers like Microsoft, among others.

Nvidia was founded in 1993 in California to integrate 3D graphics into the gaming and multimedia markets. Six years later, it debuted on the NASDAQ stock exchange after inventing the GPU. In 2001, Nvidia joined the S&P 500 and, 11 years later, joined the AI revolution by powering the AlexNet neural network.

Currently, Nvidia is the most traded company on Wall Street, accounting for about 16 per cent of all trading in S&P 500 companies. According to data, the company’s daily turnover recently averaged $50 billion, compared to Apple, Microsoft, and Tesla’s average of around $10 billion each.

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