Nvidia market cap now over $3 trillion, in second place behind Microsoft

Nvidia stock reached a historic milestone Wednesday afternoon, closing above $3 trillion in market value for the first time.

With this achievement, Nvidia has beaten out Apple, becoming the second-largest U.S. company by market capitalization, behind only Microsoft. The Nvidia market cap now stands at $3.01 trillion, with its shares climbing close to 5.2% on Wednesday, marking its first finish in the exclusive $3 trillion club.

In contrast, Apple shares rose by 0.8%, bringing the company's market value to $3 trillion, its first close at or above that level since January. This marked Apple's eighth consecutive session of gains, the longest winning streak since March 2022, when it posted 11 straight days of increases.

Nvidia stock has set record closing highs in recent days after CEO Jensen Huang announced plans over the weekend for the Blackwell Ultra chip in 2025 and a next-generation Rubin platform for 2026, which will feature new graphics-processing units and a new central-processing unit called Vera.

On Wednesday, Nvidia shares closed at $1,224.40, up 5.16% for the day. At the time of writing on 07:15 GMT on Thursday, June 6, Nvidia stock was up close to 1% in after-hours trading at the $1,235.91 mark.

The 10-for-1 Nvidia stock split is set to be completed this Friday.

Nvidia market cap needed just 66 trading days to jump from $2 to $3 trillion

The Nvidia market cap has been soaring at an unprecedented rate — according to Dow Jones Market Data, Wednesday marked just the 66th trading day since Nvidia reached a $2 trillion closing valuation, a feat accomplished significantly faster than Apple and Microsoft.

Apple took 719 trading days to move from $2 trillion to $3 trillion, while Microsoft needed 650 trading sessions to reach the same mark.

Over the past year, the Nvidia market cap has grown by $2.04 trillion, which is higher than Amazon’s entire market value. The chipmaker's valuation now exceeds the individual market caps of various sectors in the S&P 500 index — including consumer staples, energy, real estate, materials, and utilities.

The S&P 500 index closed up 1.18% on Wednesday and has gained over 12% since the start of the year. Nvidia stock has rocketed up by over 147% in the same timeframe.

Apple stock rise comes ahead of WWDC event, AI announcement

Apple's rise on Wednesday comes just days before the company is expected to unveil its highly anticipated artificial intelligence plans at the WWDC developer event, which will start with a keynote presentation on Monday.

MarketWatch cited a Tuesday note from Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives highlighting WWDC’s importance for Apple:

“In our view, WWDC represents the most important event for Apple in over a decade as the pressure to bring a generative AI stack of technology for developers and consumers is front and center”.

While Nvidia has been leveraging the AI boom, some Wall Street analysts appear to be worried that Apple may be lagging in this area — or at least in discussing its AI initiatives. At the same time, Apple faces increasing competition in its smartphone business and pressures on consumer spending.

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