Nvidia's Jensen Huang Resigns Amid Spy Scandal and Second Affair Allegation

Nvidia's board accepted founder-CEO Jensen Huang's resignation Wednesday, ending his 33-year reign after he admitted to an affair with a woman U.S. intelligence officials deemed to be a Chinese spy and a second alleged affair with a subordinate emerged. Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress was named interim CEO, and longtime director Harvey C. Jones became the company's first board chair.

The moves came after a cascade of revelations that began Sunday, when Huang acknowledged being unfaithful to his wife and linked his infidelity to "national security concerns raised in news reports." At the time, the board said it had "no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised" but launched an independent investigation [1].

Two affairs, one alleged spy

The Wall Street Journal first reported that Nvidia's board was preparing to remove Huang, and multiple outlets reported that U.S. intelligence officials deemed Alice Huang — a Singapore-based executive at AI infrastructure firm Megaspeed — a Chinese spy. The New York Times later reported that Huang also had an extramarital relationship with Kimberly Powell, the company's vice president of healthcare who reported directly to him [1][3]. Powell could not be reached for comment. Nvidia, Huang, and Powell have not confirmed the second affair [3].

Huang, 63, did not name Alice Huang in his Sunday message to employees but apologized to his family and staff, saying he was unfaithful to his wife, that his actions hurt her and their children, and that there was no excuse for what he did [3].

Megaspeed, which purchased $4.8 billion in Nvidia chips over two years, had been under investigation by U.S. and Singaporean authorities since 2025 for suspected chip diversion to China [3]. The Justice Department has since taken over the federal probe [3]. Bloomberg reported that Nvidia's general counsel, Tim Teter, intervened in a 2025 Commerce Department investigation of Megaspeed, contacting Commerce Under Secretary Jeffrey Kessler [3].

Board acts after second allegation

Nvidia's board met Wednesday to discuss Huang's future after the Times report on the second affair, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke to CNBC [4]. The board accepted Huang's resignation that night and announced it Thursday morning [2][14].

"The Board has full confidence in Colette and the leadership team, and we expect the company's operations, customer commitments and product roadmap to continue without interruption," Jones said in the company's release [14]. Kress, who joined Nvidia in 2013 after senior finance roles at Microsoft and Cisco, will retain her CFO duties while serving as interim CEO [7][14].

Market reaction and analyst skepticism

Nvidia shares fell nearly 12% in early trading Thursday, extending a decline of as much as 19% since Friday that erased more than $855 billion in market value [3]. The stock pared losses to close down about 5% as retail investors bought a record $111 million in the first half-hour [8].

Analysts cut price targets and raised risk assessments. Bernstein's Stacy Rasgon wrote that "if you find two ants in your kitchen the best estimate of the total number of ants in your kitchen is not two," citing potential for more allegations [4]. KeyBanc's John Vinh downgraded the stock, saying Huang's departure "represents a material increase in strategic, organizational, and execution risk" [4]. Baird cut its target by more than half to $200 and moved to neutral [4].

Congressional and regulatory fallout

The scandal has triggered multiple congressional inquiries. House Foreign Affairs Chair Brian Mast (R-Fla.), House Intelligence Chair Rick Crawford (R-Ark.), and House China Select Committee Chair John Moolenaar (R-Mich.) requested a closed-door briefing and threatened subpoenas [3][4]. Mast said Thursday that Huang agreed to testify before Thanksgiving [4].

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Congress must demand answers from Huang and Nvidia about national security risks, and questioned whether Trump administration officials were told not to investigate [4]. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), incoming Senate Banking Committee chair, said Huang's resignation "does not absolve him, other executives, or the company as a whole of responsibility" and called for passage of the AI Overwatch Act to strengthen export oversight [4].

Democrats on the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees launched an investigation into the Trump administration's December 2025 approval for Nvidia to sell H200 chips to Chinese companies, despite Trump reportedly being briefed on the intelligence findings about Alice Huang in late 2025 [4].

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick faces criticism from both parties for refusing to add Chinese firms to the Entity List. The White House said Trump "maintains complete confidence" in Lutnick [4].

A leadership vacuum with industry-wide implications

Huang's departure leaves a structural void. He ran a famously flat organization with roughly 60 direct reports, no COO, and no public succession plan [1][3]. Two of his children also work in executive roles at the company [3].

"Rarely has a board faced this much pressure," said Wharton professor Michael Useem. "If the board had been doing its job, it would already have a slate of possible successors" [1].

Beyond Nvidia, Huang was the central node in an AI financing web analysts call the "central bank of AI." As of July, Nvidia reported $99 billion in investments, $25 billion in commitments, $36 billion in cloud service commitments, and a $105 billion credit guarantee for an OpenAI data center in Ohio [3]. Neocloud firms CoreWeave, Nebius, and IREN — all heavily dependent on Nvidia GPUs and financing — saw shares drop about 9%, 16%, and 6.6% respectively on Thursday [3].

Huang also championed open-weight AI models, organizing a July letter that one report said was signed by hundreds of companies, while another said 25 companies signed [3][13]. He also pushed for self-regulation of AI agent safety through Nvidia's Open Agent Safety Platform [3]. Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue, whose company Nvidia agreed to acquire for $12.9 billion, called Huang's exit "a really sad day" but vowed to keep fighting for open-source AI [13].

What remains unknown

The independent investigation by Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz is ongoing. It is not yet clear whether any Nvidia technology or national security information was compromised, when Huang learned of the suspicions about Alice Huang, or whether the board was informed earlier. A proposed class-action lawsuit alleges Nvidia and Huang misled investors by concealing the relationship while describing dealings with Megaspeed as routine [3].

Nvidia reiterated plans to report fiscal third-quarter earnings November 17 [4]. The board said it will consider internal and external candidates for permanent CEO [14]. Analysts have named Ian Buck (data center VP), Bryan Catanzaro (applied deep learning VP), CTO Michael Kagan, and chief scientist Bill Dally as possible internal successors [4].