Nvidia Hits $5.4 Trillion Market Cap as Analysts Pivot to a Gigawatt-Driven Valuation Framework

Nvidia's market cap surpasses entire S&P 500 healthcare sector as Wells Fargo raises target to $315, citing AI infrastructure capacity. Earnings due May 20.

Nvidia's stock tore through another record on Monday, climbing to $223.75 and lifting the company's market capitalization above $5.4 trillion — a sum that now exceeds the combined value of all 59 companies in the S&P 500 healthcare sector. In Frankfurt, the shares closed at €188.08, a fresh 52-week high. The rally has been relentless: a 13% gain in just four trading sessions, a 17% year-to-date advance, and an approximately 62% increase over the past twelve months by one measure, with another source placing the trailing twelve-month gain at 68%.

The milestone comes as Wall Street begins rethinking how it values the chipmaker. Wells Fargo analyst Aaron Rakers lifted his price target from $265 to $315 — implying roughly 44% upside from Monday's close — and adopted an unconventional framework. Instead of traditional revenue estimates, Rakers models Nvidia's future based on installed gigawatt capacity of AI infrastructure. He projects that capacity will jump from 9.2 gigawatts in fiscal 2026 to 25.2 gigawatts by 2029, valuing the stock at 21 times his calendar 2028 earnings-per-share estimate. Despite the recent run, he notes that on a 2027 earnings basis, the valuation remains below its historical average for a company with a stronger competitive position than ever.

Underpinning that capacity buildout are Nvidia's own massive investments. In the first four months of this year alone, the company has deployed over $40 billion in AI-related stakes and infrastructure partnerships. Three deals stand out: a $30 billion commitment to OpenAI for 3 gigawatts of dedicated inference capacity on Vera Rubin systems, $3.2 billion to Corning for optical connectivity solutions aimed at increasing fiber and photonics capacity tenfold, and an investment option of up to $2.1 billion in data-center operator IREN that includes the buildout of as much as 5 gigawatts of AI infrastructure, anchored by the Sweetwater campus in Texas.

Nvidia's next-generation architecture Vera Rubin has meanwhile reached a critical milestone. The production variants of the new AI servers are finalized, and partner availability is slated for the second half of 2026. The company promises a tenfold reduction in inference costs per token compared to earlier generations. First customers will be the hyperscalers — Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Meta, and Oracle.

Analysts are also raising their sights on the near term. Susquehanna's Christopher Rolland pushed his target to $275, pointing to strong demand for Blackwell chips and growing networking revenue from NVLink and InfiniBand. He sees the upcoming GB300 rollout as a bridge to the Vera Rubin platform. Of the 70 analysts tracked by FactSet, 65 rate the stock a buy, with a median price target of $274.

The next major catalyst arrives on May 20, when Nvidia reports fiscal first-quarter results. The consensus calls for revenue of $78.8 billion and earnings per share of $1.77, matching the company's own guidance. Citi, however, expects a beat, forecasting $80 billion in revenue driven by robust demand for the Blackwell Ultra series. The bank has raised its full-year AI GPU shipment estimate to 11.2 million units, attributing the increase to the rise of agentic AI applications. Behind that demand lies a surge in hyperscaler capital spending: Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta have together lifted their 2026 capital expenditure plans to roughly $725 billion, a 77% jump from 2025. Wells Fargo projects the overall AI investment pipeline will cross $1 trillion by 2027.

Yet not all is smooth sailing. China remains a glaring risk. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has admitted that export restrictions have effectively eliminated the company's market share there. The first-quarter guidance of $78 billion explicitly excludes China revenue, and how the company plans to compensate for that shortfall is expected to be one of the most debated topics on the May 20 earnings call.

After the numbers, attention will shift to June 1, when Huang delivers a keynote at the GTC conference in Taipei. Investors will be looking for technical details on the Vera Rubin software architecture and the "Kyber" roadmap — an event that could spark another repricing of the growth story. For now, with shares trading well above all relevant moving averages and a new valuation lens centered on gigawatts, Nvidia’s bull case shows no sign of losing momentum.