You’d think quitting would make the news slow down. For Jensen Huang it did the opposite. Since Nvidia said Thursday morning that he resigned, there’s been a new affair report, a congressional deadline, a fight inside the Trump administration and a board that says it hasn’t even hired a headhunter yet.
If you need the background first, read our story on how the scandal unfolded and who runs Nvidia now. This one sticks to what’s new since Thursday morning.
Reuters reports a relationship with another employee
On Thursday afternoon, a few hours after the resignation went out, Reuters published an exclusive. “Ousted Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had an intimate relationship with a second employee, according to two people familiar with the matter, Reuters has learned,” the report said, per the Reuters copy on Investing.com.
That makes three women in the reporting so far. Alice Huang, the former Megaspeed executive US officials suspect of spying for China, isn’t an Nvidia employee. Kimberly Powell, Nvidia’s vice president of health care, was the first employee named, by the New York Times on Wednesday. The woman in the Reuters story is a different person.
Reuters didn’t name her or say what job she has. It also didn’t say when the relationship happened or whether she reported to Huang. “Nvidia declined to comment,” Reuters wrote, and Huang, Powell and a representative for the board didn’t reply. Reuters said its attempts to reach the woman “were not successful.”
So treat this one carefully. It rests on two anonymous sources, and nobody has confirmed it.
What the last days inside Nvidia looked like
A few big outlets published inside accounts on Friday. They’re unflattering, and most are based on unnamed sources.
Bloomberg described Huang by Wednesday night as “broken and shattered, his legendary energy depleted,” and said he was heard saying things like “whatever” and “I don’t care,” according to summaries in TechCrunch and Fortune.
The Wall Street Journal reported something more awkward for the company right now. Huang had been openly critical of Colette Kress, the CFO who is now interim CEO. He called her “a deer in the headlights” during a presentation this summer, per TechCrunch’s summary of the Journal.
The Financial Times, as cited by Fortune, said Huang ran Nvidia with “imperial control,” with no board chair and no compliance officer. It also reported that his daughter Madison Huang, a senior marketing director, worked as his de facto chief of staff, and that his son Spencer and son-in-law Nico Caprez work at the company too.
Why should you care about office gossip? Because the board’s job now is to show Nvidia can run without one person making every call. Stories like these make that harder to sell to investors.
The board hasn’t picked a search firm
On Thursday, Nvidia said it would look at internal and external candidates for permanent CEO, and earlier reports said directors were already working with an outside firm. On Friday, the board told CNBC it has not selected a search firm for Huang’s replacement, according to the CNBC headline and a summary from MarketAlleys. No candidates were named and no timeline was given.
That hasn’t stopped the guessing. On Thursday, prediction markets Kalshi and Polymarket gave Nvidia vice president Ian Buck, who runs its data center computing business, about 40% odds of getting the job, per Yahoo Finance’s live coverage. Analyst Dan Ives went bigger and called Apple’s Tim Cook a “dark horse candidate,” per Fortune.
Those are bets and opinions, not reporting. Harvey C. Jones, Nvidia’s new board chair, is expected to lead the search.
Congress set a Friday deadline
Here’s where things stand in Washington, as of Friday afternoon:
| Who asked | What they want | Date |
|---|---|---|
| House chairs Mast, Moolenaar and Crawford | Closed-door, transcribed interview with Huang | December 1 |
| Same House chairs | Interview with Nvidia general counsel Tim Teter | December 2 |
| Senate Banking chair Tim Scott | Huang at a public hearing | December 3 |
| Senate Banking chair Tim Scott | Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick | December 10 |
The House chairs gave Huang and Teter until 8 p.m. Friday to agree or face a subpoena, according to Decrypt. Scott wrote that if Huang doesn’t come voluntarily, the committee “is prepared to use all tools at our disposal, including subpoenas.” His post on X was shorter: “The American people deserve answers.”
Did Huang say yes? House Foreign Affairs chair Brian Mast told reporters Huang agreed to talk to lawmakers before Thanksgiving. But “No statement from Huang, his lawyers, or NVIDIA supports Mast’s account,” 24/7 Wall St. noted on Friday morning. Huang’s representatives “could not immediately be reached,” per Al Jazeera.
Democrats opened a separate track. Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Richard Neal said they will investigate how the administration handled Nvidia’s China chip sales, and Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Chris Coons asked officials to preserve records on those exports, per TechCrunch and Decrypt.
The pressure moved to Howard Lutnick
A lot of Friday’s anger in Washington landed on the Commerce Department, which writes and enforces chip export rules.
A Lutnick spokesperson told NBC News he had “proactively agreed to appear voluntarily,” per Decrypt, and a US official told CBS News the date is December 10. The White House says President Trump “maintains complete confidence” in him. But Reuters and Politico both reported that senior aides are discussing whether to push him out, according to Latin Times.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent pointed the finger too. He told CNBC, “They were in favor of putting Megaspeed on the Entity List for months,” and added that “Commerce BIS has the pen,” per CBS News. The Entity List is the US trade blacklist, and BIS is the Commerce office that runs it.
New evidence on the chips, and China pushes back
Bloomberg reported that banned Nvidia chips were found at a Shanghai data center linked to a company founded by Alice Huang, per Latin Times. It’s the first report of restricted hardware physically sitting inside China in this case. Megaspeed denies any illegal transfers and says it hired a US law firm to audit its GPU inventory.
Bloomberg also reported that the US Attorney’s Office in Manhattan is looking at whether Alice Huang helped smuggle Super Micro products, per Yahoo Finance. Attorney General Todd Blanche said Thursday the Justice Department hasn’t reached a conclusion. No charges have been filed against her, and Beijing denies she is a spy.
China responded on Friday. Foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said China “has consistently opposed the abuse of export control measures,” per CBS News and AFP. On Thursday, Beijing called the allegations a “pretext for imposing a technological blockade.”
Four days until earnings
All of this lands right before Nvidia reports third-quarter results on Tuesday, November 17, after the market closes. It’ll be Kress’s first call as interim CEO. The company guided for about $108 billion in revenue, and that number already excludes China, according to 24/7 Wall St.
The stock is still sliding. Nvidia closed Thursday at $166.19, down 4.34%, and fell again Friday, dipping below a $4 trillion market value at one point. We covered that in today’s market slide.
If you own Nvidia, here’s what to watch over the next few days:
- Huang’s answer to the House. A yes means a December 1 interview. A no probably means a subpoena.
- Tuesday’s call. Listen for whether any big customer delayed orders, and whether Kress gives a CEO search timeline.
- Lutnick’s job. If he goes, export rules could get tighter fast, which affects what Nvidia can sell abroad.
- The Reuters report. If Nvidia or the board’s investigator, Joon Kim, confirms it, expect more questions about who knew what.
