6 charts that capture Nvidia’s AI-fueled rise

Nvidia (NVDA) has outperformed every stock in the S&P 500 (^GSPC) since the launch of ChatGPT in late November 2022.

Shares in the chipmaker have risen nearly 700% since ChatGPT brought the power of artificial intelligence to the masses, far outpacing the S&P 500’s roughly 45% over the same time period. The next closest gain for an S&P 500 company in that time period is a 540% pop for Vistra Corp (VST).

Nvidia has established itself as the key provider of chips needed to operate AI systems. Now at the epicenter of an AI arms race, Nvidia has established itself as a cornerstone of the recent bull market in stocks as the company’s sales and profits have skyrocketed over the past several years.

Ahead of the company’s next quarterly earnings release on May 28, we broke down some of the most eye-popping charts that show how Nvidia became one of the most-followed stocks in the market.

There’s perhaps no clearer way to see how Nvidia ran away from the competition in the AI boom than looking at the company’s market capitalization against its peers. Back when ChatGPT launched, Nvidia had a market cap of just over $400 billion. It’s now over $3.3 trillion. Over that same time period, chip competitor Intel’s (INTC) market cap has actually decreased, while Advanced Micro Devices’ (AMD) market cap has increased incrementally from $125 billion to $177 billion.

Nvidia’s rise proved to be at the center of a new technological boom. Combined with Nvidia, the rise in dominance of six other companies — Apple (AAPL), Alphabet (GOOGL, GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT), Amazon (AMZN), Meta (META), and Tesla (TSLA) — formed what would come to be known as the “Magnificent Seven.”

The group began the AI boom with a combined market cap just shy of $7 billion. Now, two and a half years later, the Big Tech group’s market cap is worth over $16.8 trillion. The seven companies have grown from about 22% of the S&P 500’s market cap in November 2022 to 32% of the index’s market cap today.

Given the outsized weighting in the S&P 500, large swings in shares of Nvidia have become a feature of how even broad market investors are thinking about the direction of stocks. In June 2024, three Wall Street strategists boosted their year-end S&P 500 targets, citing better-than-expected consistent performance among key AI players.

As of May 19, the Magnificent Seven have accounted for about 52% of the S&P 500’s gain since Nov. 30, 2022. Nvidia alone has contributed 17.21%, by far the most among the group, with the next closest stock, Microsoft, which has added about 8.8%.