Nvidia (NVDA) has had one CEO in 33 years, and its board is reportedly preparing to remove him. Shares were down 7.80% in overnight trading early Thursday, according to Yahoo Finance, as investors weighed a future without Jensen Huang.
Some analysts see a 20% drop if he leaves with no clear successor. Earlier cases suggest the larger risk comes afterward.
Do Stocks Recover After a CEO Is Fired? Nvidia Faces the Test
Intel and McDonald’s offer the closest comparison. Both CEOs left over consensual relationships with employees, a breach of company policy.
Intel fell 2.4% on June 21, 2018, the day Brian Krzanich resigned. McDonald’s slipped 2.7% on November 4, 2019, the first session after it fired Steve Easterbrook.
The two stocks then diverged over the following 12 months. Intel lost 11.7% while the S&P 500 gained 6.8%. McDonald’s rose 9.6%, ahead of the index’s 7.9%.
Succession was one visible difference between them. Intel named its finance chief as interim CEO and began a search. McDonald’s promoted its US president, Chris Kempczinski, in the same announcement.
A Ready Successor Helps, but Wynn Shows the Limit
Two further cases test whether a quick handover is enough.
HP dropped 8% in the session after Mark Hurd’s forced resignation in August 2010. The board needed almost two months to name a replacement, then fired him within a year. HP stood 29.5% lower 12 months after Hurd left, against a 6.9% gain for the index.
Wynn Resorts moved faster. Founder Steve Wynn resigned in February 2018 after misconduct allegations, and president Matt Maddox took over immediately. The stock had slid 18.6% while his future was in doubt, then jumped 8.6% on his exit.
However, Wynn shares still sat 19.5% lower a year later, while the S&P 500 added 1.4%.
The Seat Nobody Has Been Groomed to Fill
On succession, Nvidia resembles the weaker cases. Huang has no obvious successor. Semafor reported that some directors favor finance chief Colette Kress as interim CEO.
Gene Munster of Deepwater told CNBC that a founder-led company with no clear number two risks a 20% correction. Seaport’s Jay Goldberg called a drop of that size only the near-term shock.
Huang’s record adds a second risk. A 2021 study by Paul Farah and Hui Li examined 187 forced CEO departures at S&P 1500 companies. Stocks delivered negative abnormal returns over the next three years when the ousted CEO had outperformed. Huang fits that profile, with Nvidia up about 267% in three years.
Some of the damage to Nvidia stock may already be priced. Including the overnight move to $160.18, Nvidia stock sits about 14% below its November 6 close.
That was the final session before the board announced its investigation. The scandal also landed during a wider selloff, with AI chip valuations at their lowest since 2011.
Will Jensen Huang Sell His Nvidia Shares?
Past ousters carried one more risk, which is the founder selling his own shares. Steve Wynn sold his entire 11.8% stake for $2.1 billion within seven weeks of resigning, Reuters reported. A repeat looks less likely at Nvidia.
Huang owns about 3.6% of the company, according to CNBC. Roughly 800 million of those shares sit in trusts held jointly with his wife. CNBC’s Robert Frank called that structure a stabilizing factor for shareholders.
“Jensen Huang directly holds only about 70 million shares, worth about $12 billion … The bottom line, Jensen Huang has very limited economic control over Nvidia, with just 3.6% ownership and even less control since those shares are held in trust with his wife,” he said.
These precedents have limits, since four cases are a small sample and none matched Nvidia’s size. Other pressures also weighed on each company during those years. A named successor before the November 17 earnings report would weaken the comparison with Intel and HP.
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