Nvidia’s Two-Pronged Push: A $108 Million AI Research Bet and a Direct Appeal to Beijing

Jensen Huang's foundation commits $108M to CoreWeave for AI computing, locking researchers into Nvidia's hardware. Investors soar on analyst upgrades and earnings anticipation.

Jensen Huang has been busy on two very different fronts. While the Nvidia chief executive was making an impromptu trip to China alongside President Trump, his family foundation quietly committed $108.3 million to fund AI research computing — a move that tightens the company’s grip on the scientific ecosystem even as Huang tries to prise open the world’s largest chip market.

The donation, completed on May 13, buys cloud computing time from CoreWeave, a specialist provider of AI infrastructure in which Nvidia invested $2 billion in January 2026. The foundation also holds a multi-year capacity agreement worth $6.3 billion with the neocloud firm. Universities and non-profit research institutes will receive free access to train models, along with technical support from Nvidia. The philanthropic veneer is thin: the arrangement locks researchers into a hardware stack that runs almost exclusively on Nvidia chips.

That ecosystem logic extends beyond academia. Nvidia’s investment in CoreWeave — now one of its largest shareholders — creates a virtuous circle in which the chipmaker finances a customer that in turn buys and resells Nvidia hardware. Institutional investors are watching closely to see whether real end-user demand is outrunning these internal ecosystem effects.

Investors have nonetheless rewarded the strategy. Nvidia shares closed at a record 192.86 euros on Wednesday, marking a new all-time high, and touched 193.16 euros intraday. The stock has gained nearly 7% over the past week and more than 16% over the past month. It now trades roughly 18% above its 50-day moving average and 22% above the 200-day line.

The rally has been fuelled by a flurry of analyst upgrades. Bank of America lifted its price target to $320 with a buy rating, while Wells Fargo raised its target to $315, citing sustained demand for AI infrastructure. RBC pointed out that demand for AI compute power is likely to outstrip supply well into 2027. Susquehanna reaffirmed its “Positive” stance on May 13. Among 54 analysts tracking Nvidia, the consensus remains a firm “Buy,” though Morningstar holds a more conservative fair value estimate of $260.

All eyes now turn to May 20, when Nvidia reports first-quarter results for fiscal 2027. The consensus calls for revenue of $78.8 billion and earnings per share of $1.77, with the data-center segment alone expected to contribute roughly $73 billion. Management is expected to update the market on the ramp of Blackwell Ultra and the upcoming Rubin architecture, set for late 2026. Both platforms together are projected to generate cumulative revenue of $1 trillion by 2027. The company is also pushing “Agentic AI” — autonomous systems that plan and execute complex tasks — as a key demand driver, since such workloads require enormous inference compute.

The earnings call will also be scrutinised for any progress on China, where Huang’s diplomatic gambit has raised hopes of a thaw. The Nvidia chief joined Elon Musk and Tim Cook aboard Air Force One during a stopover in Alaska, answering a last-minute invitation from Trump to join the trade delegation to Beijing. The objective: securing market access for Nvidia’s H200 processors.

The problem is that China already has US export licences for the H200 but has blocked imports anyway, favouring domestic alternatives from Huawei and Alibaba. Huang has described Nvidia’s effective market share in China as “zero” and put the potential opportunity at $50 billion. Nvidia recently resumed H200 production for the Chinese market after adjustments to export rules, but each sale carries a 25% surcharge that goes directly to the US Treasury. Industry estimates peg potential demand at up to 1.5 million units. More advanced chips, including Blackwell and the future Rubin series, remain off-limits.

Analysts caution that a fundamental reversal in semiconductor trade policy is unlikely, but the direct involvement of tech CEOs in trade talks signals a more serious negotiating posture. Whether the trip yields anything concrete will be measured against the earnings report — and whether Nvidia’s growth story can hold without the China prize.

There are internal pressures too. Nvidia’s gross margin peaked at 76.5% in the final quarter of fiscal 2026, but rising memory costs and the enormous power requirements of AI customers are expected to squeeze that figure gradually. The market will therefore focus on three things when results land: the quality of demand, the margin trajectory during the Blackwell ramp, and any concrete statements on China. Those three factors will determine how resilient the current valuation — a market cap of $5.5 trillion — really is.