Nvidia Fuels AI Growth with Major Investments

Nvidia has aggressively invested in AI infrastructure companies throughout 2026, deploying over $40 billion in commitments. This strategy includes substantial stakes in public equities and recent deals with data center operator IREN, allowing for up to $2.1 billion in investment, and Corning, with up to $3.2 billion. These investments have positively impacted the stock prices of the companies involved.

Nvidia, the primary beneficiary of the AI boom due to its essential GPUs, has seen its market capitalization soar to approximately $5.2 trillion, making it the world's most valuable business. The company's stock has risen more than 11-fold over the past four years. To maintain its market dominance, Nvidia is financing the entire AI supply chain, ensuring it operates on its hardware and meets growing demand.

Concerns are surfacing that Nvidia's extensive investments in other AI companies may primarily serve to fuel its own growth, mirroring strategies used by cloud giants like Google and Amazon. With $97 billion in free cash flow last fiscal year, Nvidia's approach of backing its chip customers and even leasing compute back to them has drawn comparisons to the vendor financing that contributed to the dot-com bubble.