TOKYO — World shares were mixed on Thursday as concerns over leadership at chipmaker Nvidia weighed on artificial intelligence-related stocks.
In after-hours trading, Nvidia’s shares fell 8.6 per cent after reports said Nvidia’s board was meeting late Wednesday to discuss the situation surrounding its CEO, Jensen Huang, whose affair with a Chinese woman has raised national security concerns in the U.S.
Nvidia ‘s shares climbed 2.9 per cent on Wednesday. Its shares have fallen after the company said it was investigating Huang, who has admitted to a relationship with a businesswoman who reportedly fed intelligence and advanced chips to China.
The future for the S&P 500 slipped 0.4 per cent, while that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average was nearly unchanged.
In early European trading, France’s CAC 40 added 0.7 per cent and the German DAX rose 1.0 per cent to 26,939.92. Britain’s FTSE 100 jumped 0.3 per cent to 10,868.98.
In Asian trading, Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 shed 0.7 per cent to 60,819.36.
In South Korea, the Kospi gave up early gains to slip 0.6 per cent to 5,342.73. Taiwan’s Taiex lost 2.6 per cent. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 declined nearly 0.1 per cent to 9,146.80.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 1.3 per cent to 24,008.55, while the Shanghai Composite fell 0.7 per cent to 3,655.83.
Apart from Nvidia’s situation, investors are worried about a potential slowdown in the overall AI industry given longstanding questions about whether it will prove profitable enough to make massive investments in the technology worthwhile.
Analysts also said people might still be taking a risk, snatching up Nvidia shares at what appears to be a discount because of uncertainty over what Huang’s woes might mean for the company.
“There is no credible way to put a precise revenue loss on his departure,” said Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote.
“Customers buy Nvidia’s computing power, software and networking ecosystem, and those advantages wouldn’t disappear with its CEO,” she said.
Benchmark U.S. crude rose 0.8 per cent to US$87.26 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, added 0.8 per cent to $93.53 a barrel. Brent has vacillated within a range of $72 to $120 since the war with Iran pushed prices much higher.
In currency trading, the U.S. dollar fell to 159.64 Japanese yen from 159.79 yen. The euro cost $1.1095, up from $1.1091.
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Yuri Kageyama, The Associated Press
