Jensen Huang resigns from Nvidia after third affair: from technical press to pink press with stock market fall

What promised to be a story from the tech section — the leader of the company that dominates AI chips — ended up being a soap opera with knock-on effects on Wall Street. Jensen Huang, Nvidia's co-founder and CEO for 33 years, tendered his resignation Thursday after a third affair within his own company was confirmed, adding to two previous extramarital affairs that had already rocked the silicon giant. What would once have been hallway gossip now makes front-page headlines across the U.S. media, except that this time the gossip costs billions of dollars. The script had three acts. First, the relationship with Alice Huang, a Megaspeed executive whom U.S. intelligence points to as a possible Chinese spy, revealed by The New York Times on October 29. Second, the affair with Kimberly Powell, Nvidia's vice president of health who reported directly to him, reported by the same Times on November 11. And third, a separate relationship with another employee of the company that Reuters confirmed on Thursday, just as Huang had already announced his departure. Three women, three names, a CEO out of office. The scandal would not have transcended beyond social networks if it had not caused a resounding fall in NVIDIA shares. The stock lost 4.3% in a single session, with intraday falls of up to 14%, and accumulates 11% in just five days, according to CNBC and Associated Press. Reuters reports that the company lost about $430 billion in market value in two sessions, while Axios estimates the loss since the first scandal broke out in late October at $1 trillion. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq also felt the hit, and Bernstein cut his price target on Nvidia in half, from $400 to $200. All because of a series of affairs that, in any other company, would be a matter of human resources and not a global stock market crisis.The U.S. press covered the outcome as if it were a final chapter of a television series: The Wall Street Journal announced Huang's dismissal, Politico highlighted the 8% drop in after-hours operations, NPR and PBS explained who Colette Kress is, the CFO who takes over as interim, and The New York Times maintained a minute-by-minute blog with each new detail. The funny thing is that the same media that normally cover Nvidia talking about chip architectures, CUDA and data centers now dedicated their covers to who kissed whom in a hotel during the March developer conference. The technical press became, for a few days, a show business magazine with a stock balance.And of course, the internet did what it does best: turn drama into memes. On Reddit, users of r/wallstreetbets joked that there will always be a "fourth and fifth affair" to keep the story alive, while on r/PeterExplainsTheJoke the joke of the "three-body problem" went viral, playing on the science fiction book and Huang's own shaky ending. AI-generated videos circulated on X and TikTok — ironically, almost certainly rendered on Nvidia graphics cards — showing Huang singing "Careless Whisper," "Confessions Part II" or being edited with Bill Clinton's famous line: "I didn't have sex with that woman."The punchline is almost poetic: the CEO of the company that provides the hardware for the most advanced artificial intelligence on the planet was brought down not by a Chinese competitor, not by a chip architecture failure, not by antitrust regulation, but by a chain of affairs that left the entertainment section to land on Wall Street's ledger. While memes continue to circulate and the stock market searches for a floor, an uncomfortable lesson remains for the technological media: when the power of a company depends so much on a single person, their personal life ceases to be private and becomes systemic risk. Sources:• The New York Times — Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and alleged Chinese spy relationship• The New York Times — Jensen Huang affair with Nvidia executive Kimberly Powell• Reuters — Former Nvidia CEO Huang had relationship with second employee• Associated Press — Jensen Huang steps down and Nvidia shares drop• CNBC — Nvidia stock closes down over 4% after CEO Jensen Huang announces resignation• POLITICO — Nvidia shares plummet as turmoil envelops chip-making behemoth• USA Today — Jensen Huang, Nvidia memes have lots to say about AI and Chinese spies• Breitbart — Roundup Meme: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang mercilessly mocked Originally published in Digitalia.