Jensen Huang resigns as Nvidia CEO, CFO Colette Kress named interim chief

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Fox News contributor Michael Pillsbury discusses the resignation of Nividia CEO Jensen Huang and the long-term controversy with U.S. policy in China. foxbusiness.com

Nvidia CFO Colette Kress foxbusiness.com

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang foxbusiness.com

Former Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang in Washington foxbusiness.com

Rep. Ro Khanna speaks to reporters. (Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP) Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP

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Jensen Huang resigned as Nvidia's chief executive on Thursday, ending a tenure that began when he co-founded the company in 1993. Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress — finance chief at Nvidia since 2013, before that a 13-year run at Microsoft and a CFO posting at Cisco — takes over as interim chief. Nvidia shares fell 4.3 percent to 166.19 dollars on the news.

The proximate cause is personal: reports of multiple extramarital affairs, one of them with Alice Huang, a former executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed whom US intelligence officials suspect of collecting intelligence for Beijing and of helping route high-end Nvidia chips to Chinese users in breach of export controls. Nvidia's board has opened an independent investigation, the Justice Department is probing Megaspeed, and the FBI is examining the alleged intelligence operation. Bret Kenwell of eToro called Huang "more than a CEO," part of the investment thesis itself; Michael Landsberg of Landsberg Bennett called the resignation "the worst-case scenario during this entire saga." Susannah Streeter of Wealth Club describes Kress as a "safe pair of hands" who nonetheless lacks Huang's global status, leaving Nvidia facing uncertainty over strategic priorities, pricing and supply agreements. Dan Ives of Yorkville Ives says his firm always expected Kress to run a major public tech company — on the assumption she would have to leave Nvidia to get one.

Quiver Quantitative flagged a filing showing President Trump sold up to one million dollars of Nvidia stock on August 21, since when the shares have fallen 29 percent; White House spokesperson Davis Ingle says third-party financial institutions manage the president's portfolio, which replicates "recognized indexes, such as the Schwab 1000." Trade With Congress, a congressional trade tracker, flagged two sales by a trust linked to the wife of Representative Ro Khanna — September 4 and October 7, each valued between 1,001 and 15,000 dollars, the second one day after Nvidia's record close — together avoiding a drop of about 26 percent. Khanna sits on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party and is ranking member of an Armed Services subcommittee on cyber, innovative technologies and information systems. His office says neither he nor his staff received any briefing on Megaspeed, Huang or counterintelligence risks tied to Nvidia, and that an independent trustee manages a trust his in-laws established before his marriage. In April, Khanna and Huang shared a Stanford stage to discuss American leadership in AI.

Nvidia reports quarterly earnings on Tuesday, Kress's first appearance as chief. Trump, whose August filing records the Nvidia sale, says there is only one man to replace Huang.