Nvidia, whose graphics processing units, or GPUs, dominate the market for AI chips, has fallen 7% since closing at a record high on April 27
There’s little evidence so far to suggest that Nvidia is losing significant ground to rivals Nvidia shares fall 7% despite strong AI chip market dominanceAlphabet and Amazon rivals gain in AI chip marketNvidia’s revenue growth expected to slow in coming yearsDid our AI summary help?
This earnings season has delivered plenty of good news for the artificial intelligence trade, but instead of bidding up Nvidia Corp. shares, investors have been dumping them.Nvidia, whose graphics processing units, or GPUs, dominate the market for AI chips, has fallen 7% since closing at a record high on April 27. Over that span, the stock is one of the worst performers in the Philadelphia semiconductor index, which is up about 9%.The reason is that even as tech giants keep pledging to spend more on computing gear, Nvidia’s grip on the AI processor market is seen as increasingly under threat from other chipmakers as well as its biggest customers.Nvidia rose as much as 2.6% in early trading Wednesday.On Tuesday the Information reported that Anthropic PBC, which is already a major customer of Google’s chips, is planning to spend about $200 billion with the Alphabet Inc.-owned company over the next five years. That comes a week after Alphabet said it would start offering its tensor processing unit, or TPU, chips to select customers for use in their own data centers.Amazon.com Inc., meanwhile, said its Trainium line of custom AI chips have more than $225 billion in revenue commitments and it recently announced a multi-billion dollar pledge from Meta, which is itself preparing to deploy homegrown AI chips. Meanwhile, Intel Corp. is benefiting from AI growth and Qualcomm Inc. is also making headway in the data center market.“The problem with having basically 100% market share is that there’s only one direction for it to go, and it certainly seems like these companies could be credible competitors,” said Bill Stone, chief investment officer at Glenview Trust Company.There’s little evidence so far to suggest that Nvidia is losing significant ground to rivals. The company’s share of the AI accelerator market was 86% in 2025, unchanged from 2024, according to data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence. But the threat is raising doubts about the outlook for its long-term growth and making other stocks look relatively more attractive.Nvidia shares are up 7.8% this year, roughly in line with the S&P 500, but the gain pales in comparison to other chip-related companies. The Philadelphia semiconductor index has jumped 60%, leaving Nvidia as one of the worst performers among the benchmark’s 30 constituents in 2026.“If we start to get the sense that Nvidia is losing marginal business, that rivals are chipping away at its market share or pricing power, then that could start to erode its earnings momentum and we could see the stock fall off as a result,” said Stone, who helps oversee $18 billion in assets.A representative for Nvidia declined to comment, citing a quiet period.Insatiable demand for AI computing gear fueled Nvidia’s rise to become the world’s most valuable company with a market value of $4.8 trillion. But it’s close to being overtaken by Alphabet, which has seen its market value soar by more than $2.5 trillion over the past year amid excitement about its AI services, which include its popular Gemini chatbot, as well as cloud computing and chip businesses. Alphabet closed on Tuesday with a market value of about $4.7 trillion.Of course, Nvidia’s revenue growth is still booming. The projected 70% expansion in its current fiscal year, which ends in January, dwarfs growth expected from other megacaps and would be an increase from last year’s 65% clip. But it’s expected to slow to 32% in fiscal 2028, before narrowing further in the subsequent two years. The company is scheduled to report first quarter earnings on May 20.For Nvidia’s bulls, demand for AI processors remains so strong that there’s plenty of revenue growth to go around. Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft, plan to spend as much as $725 billion this year on capital expenditures and significantly more in 2027. The four companies account for about 45% of Nvidia’s revenue, according to supply chain data compiled by Bloomberg.However, most of these companies “appear to be putting equal emphasis on heterogenous deployments” of both Nvidia’s chips and custom-made chips, Bank of America analyst Vivek Arya wrote in a research note on April 29.Notably, Alphabet’s TPUs are seen as one of the best alternatives to Nvidia’s products, and the business has been called Alphabet’s “secret sauce” given they were specifically designed to accelerate machine learning workloads.In a sign of how meaningful this business could be, Citizens analyst Andrew Boone estimated that Alphabet will generate about $3 billion of revenue from TPU-related infrastructure in 2026, increasing to $25 billion in 2027.“I wouldn’t say that Nvidia’s competitive positioning is materially threatened by these new chips, but the market action in Nvidia reflects how people are starting to question its market share, its competitive moat, and its margins,” said Clayton Allison, portfolio manager at Prime Capital Financial, which has about $40 billion in assets.Late Tuesday, Advanced Micro Devices Inc. said it’s expecting a significant jump in demand for central processing units, or CPUs, as the type of generalist chips take on a bigger role in running AI services. AMD jumped 20% on Wednesday.None of this has dampened enthusiasm about Nvidia among Wall Street analysts. Of the 80 tracked by Bloomberg that cover the company, there are only three hold ratings and one sell. Estimates for Nvidia’s earnings in fiscal 2027 have risen by 11% over the past quarter, while the view for revenue is up by the same amount. Estimates for 2028 have moved up even higher, suggesting investors remain confident about its long-term trajectory.“Nvidia used to be the sure thing in AI, but it has fallen out of favor on that front, while Alphabet is now the can’t-miss AI darling,” said Glenview’s Stone. “I don’t think new chips will represent a fatal blow, but they’ll make it harder for Nvidia to regain its momentum. I’m not selling, but I’m not buying the dip, either.”