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NVIDIA's CEO Jensen Huang (Photo by Josh Edelson /Getty Images)

Nvidia had the 2nd-largest stock decline, ever

Where does Nvidia's recent plunge rank in the steepest stock crashes?

Jack Raines

Stocks don’t always go up, even recent top performers like Nvidia.

The high-flying chipmaker was down 10% on Friday, likely related to Super Micro Computer (SMCI) dropping 23% after declining to provide preliminary revenue results before earnings.

Nvidia’s market capitalization, which had recently passed $2 trillion, declined by $212 billion, or 6.8 Delta Airlines, on Friday’s drop.

Elon Musk referred to this drop as “rookie numbers,” but Nvidia’s decline was actually bigger, in market capitalization terms, than any Tesla decline.

In fact, Nvidia just suffered the second biggest market capitalization decline by any company ever. How does Nvidia’s decline size up against the biggest market cap declines by the rest of the “Magnificent Seven” stocks?

  1. On February 2, 2022, Meta fell 26% on a poor earnings report that offered weak revenue guidance, and the social media giant lost a record $252 billion in market cap.

  2. Nvidia’s 10%, $212 billion decline last Friday.

  3. Amazon’s stock fell 14%, shedding $206 billion of market value, on April 29, 2022 on a disappointing earnings report showing an e-commerce slowdown as pandemic tailwinds slowed.

  4. Apple fell 8%, losing $182 billion in market value on September 3, 2020, in a broader tech sector sell off.

  5. Microsoft lost $177 billion in a 15% decline on March 16, 2020, as the entire market collapsed at the beginning of the Covid-19 outbreak.

  6. Alphabet lost $166 billion in market value on October 25, 2023, after the stock slid 9% on news that the company’s Google Cloud unit missed analyst estimates.

  7. Tesla shares lost $140 billion in market value after falling 12% on November 9th, 2021, after Elon Musk published a Twitter poll asking his followers if he should sell 10% of his Tesla stock.

Far from "rookie numbers," Nvidia's recent decline was around $70 billion greater than any Tesla decline in history, nearly setting the all-time record for an individual stock.

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AI server cluster maker Penguin Solutions takes flight

Small-cap AI server cluster maker Penguin Solutions surged Thursday after posting better-than-expected Q2 revenue and profit numbers Wednesday after the close, along with an increase in full-year sales and profit guidance.

The company, which was known as Smart Global Holdings until July 2024, has positioned itself as a provider of “end-to-end AI infrastructure solutions.”

Its Advanced Computing division designs and sells computers, cabling, and cooling systems, the server racks and clusters of racks AI data centers need. Its other main division sells flash and DRAM memory products.

It’s a pretty small company, with a fully diluted market cap of just over $1 billion and roughly 2,900 employees, according to FactSet.

The stock is volatile. Penguin dove during last year’s tariff tantrum that followed “Liberation Day” in April. Then it turned tail and doubled through early October amid a surge of call options activity, which tends to reflect retail interest. From the October peak, it then plunged by about 50%, before Thursday’s renaissance.

For what it’s worth, call options activity in Penguin is pretty busy today, too — relatively speaking — with roughly 2,625 traded as of 1:15 p.m. ET. That’s the most since early January, when the company last reported quarterly numbers. The average volume over the previous 25 trading sessions is about 325 calls a day, FactSet data shows.

Penguin Solutions Stock Takes Off On AI Bolstered Outlook

Penguin Solutions Stock Takes Off On AI Bolstered Outlook

The company, which was known as Smart Global Holdings until July 2024, has positioned itself as a provider of “end-to-end AI infrastructure solutions.”

Its Advanced Computing division designs and sells computers, cabling, and cooling systems, the server racks and clusters of racks AI data centers need. Its other main division sells flash and DRAM memory products.

It’s a pretty small company, with a fully diluted market cap of just over $1 billion and roughly 2,900 employees, according to FactSet.

The stock is volatile. Penguin dove during last year’s tariff tantrum that followed “Liberation Day” in April. Then it turned tail and doubled through early October amid a surge of call options activity, which tends to reflect retail interest. From the October peak, it then plunged by about 50%, before Thursday’s renaissance.

For what it’s worth, call options activity in Penguin is pretty busy today, too — relatively speaking — with roughly 2,625 traded as of 1:15 p.m. ET. That’s the most since early January, when the company last reported quarterly numbers. The average volume over the previous 25 trading sessions is about 325 calls a day, FactSet data shows.

markets
Luke Kawa

Momentum returns to optics stocks as the release valve for AI optimism

Potentially imminent end to the war? Buy optics stocks.

Maybe not? Buy optics stocks anyway.

Effectively all the juice left in the AI trade is coming from optics (and memory) stocks. And the latter group is taking a bit of a breather today while the former continues to surge.

Shares of Ciena Corp., Lumentum, and Coherent are building on recent big gains and among the biggest gainers in the S&P 500 near midday, while Applied Optoelectronics is also surging on Thursday.

These companies all provide solutions that help information move around in data centers, and thus are key beneficiaries of the aggressive capex plans of hyperscalers. Nvidia has invested $2 billion apiece in Coherent and Lumentum in deals that also include purchase commitments.

markets
Matt Phillips

Space stocks rip during a topsy-turvy day for the equity market

Satellite-services-from-space stocks surged Thursday after reports that Amazon is in talks to buy Globalstar, which provides voice and connectivity services from its satellite network. It also can’t hurt that the general mood around space is ebullient, following the successful launch of Artemis II on Thursday.

Planet Labs and ViaSat also soared on the news.

The gains for EchoStar — seen as a backdoor play at pre-IPO SpaceX exposure — and Rocket Lab were more muted, perhaps because a deep-pocketed competitor like Jeff Bezos getting serious about space services could complicate the plans of the two largest commercial space launch companies.

Rocket Lab and SpaceX see launch services as key to their aspirations of being major providers of voice and data services from low-Earth orbit satellites.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX is the dominant provider of such services, and the early rumors on the company’s planned IPO — expected to be the largest ever — suggest the market is very excited about the prospects for the industry.

Elsewhere in the space stock world, Intuitive Machines — a maker of space infrastructure that provides services to NASA for lunar missions — also rose.

Globalstar surges after FT reports that Amazon is in talks to buy the satellite group

Globalstar surges after FT reports that Amazon is in talks to buy the satellite group

The gains for EchoStar — seen as a backdoor play at pre-IPO SpaceX exposure — and Rocket Lab were more muted, perhaps because a deep-pocketed competitor like Jeff Bezos getting serious about space services could complicate the plans of the two largest commercial space launch companies.

Rocket Lab and SpaceX see launch services as key to their aspirations of being major providers of voice and data services from low-Earth orbit satellites.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX is the dominant provider of such services, and the early rumors on the company’s planned IPO — expected to be the largest ever — suggest the market is very excited about the prospects for the industry.

Elsewhere in the space stock world, Intuitive Machines — a maker of space infrastructure that provides services to NASA for lunar missions — also rose.

Hyunsoo Rim, David Crowther
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The S&P 500 just had its worst quarter in years. Here are the biggest winners and losers.

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