Chip giant Nvidia (NVDA) continues writing new chapters in the AI playbook.
A smashing success thus far, 2025 has been marked by blockbuster earnings and historic market cap highs.
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Yet, there were a few moments when the momentum seemed to slip, as if something major had stalled.
However, a seismic breakthrough may have repositioned Nvidia to be the center of AI and the one defining its future.
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Nvidia: A $4 trillion juggernaut fueled by AI demand
Nvidia’s performance in 2025 has been nothing short of historic.
It started off the year with fireworks, as its fiscal Q4 results in February blew past expectations.
Revenue surged to $39.3 billion, a massive quarter that helped erase the sting of the Deep Seek-led $600 billion market cap drop in January.
Its Q1 earnings print was perhaps even more impressive.
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Nvidia posted $44.1 billion in sales for the quarter ending April 27, up a superb 69% year-over-year. Data center sales skyrocketed 73% to $39.1 billion, fueled by relentless demand for generative AI.
Wall Street didn’t hesitate, either.
The stock’s up over 22% year-to-date, having surpassed the $4 trillion market cap (the first company to do so).
A huge part of what’s driving its fundamentals and stock is Blackwell.
Nvidia’s new Blackwell AI chips have taken the data center business by storm, now accounting for roughly 50% of total sales.
Their performance edge, along with Nvidia’s robust CUDA ecosystem, has made Nvidia a no-brainer for enterprise and hyperscale AI customers.
Needham lifts Nvidia stock forecast to $200 as China sales path reopens
Needham is the latest Wall Street giant to crank up Nvidia’s price target, and the jump is big.
The firm bumped its price target to $200 from $160, while maintaining a buy rating, following Nvidia’s confirmation that it’s gearing up to resume H20 chip sales to China.
U.S. government assurances that export licenses for those chips will be granted have cleared the path for Nvidia to restart a sales channel — worth billions — that’s been locked for months.
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N. Quinn Bolton and his team note that the April export controls led to $2.5 billion in H20 product being impacted for Q1 fiscal 2026.
Also, the restrictions froze an additional $8 billion worth of orders lined up for Q2. That sales freeze in particular hit the hardest, since the H20 was designed specifically to comply with earlier restrictions.
Now, Needham expects a rebound.
The firm is modeling a whopping $3 billion in H20 shipments per quarter beginning in Q3 (October), stretching over multiple quarters.
It also flagged a much deeper product push that could underscore the company’s China comeback.
Nvidia is looking to build localized variants of its Blackwell GPUs like the B30, B40, and RTX 6000D, with shipments expected to begin early in August or September.
These chips will be export-compliant and tailor-made for customers navigating the geopolitical climate.
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For Nvidia, it couldn’t come at a better time.
Following months of geopolitical whiplash, a clear path back into the China AI market could help Nvidia regain sales, solidify its footprint, and reestablish momentum in the region.
Dan Ives and Gene Munster turn up the volume on Nvidia
Wall Street’s tech bulls are also singing the praises of Nvidia’s China pivot.
Wedbush’s Dan Ives hails the H20 sales reset as a “watershed moment” and a “monster win” for CEO Jensen Huang after his meeting with President Donald Trump.
Ives calls this a high-stakes poker move in the U.S.-China tech race, helping Washington retain leverage in the AI arms race.
The firm expects Street estimates to “go up meaningfully” as China reopens, considering the market contributes 15% of Nvidia’s revenue.
Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management is perhaps even more aggressive.
He feels the update should add a hefty 10% to Nvidia’s consensus sales estimates over the next four quarters.
Also, Nvidia’s growth could hit 35% or more for its current fiscal year.
In short, Munster believes the market is underestimating how early we’re placed in the investment cycle.
China’s demand for H20 chips shows that this boom still has legs.
Investors seem to agree, with Nvidia stock popping 4% on the news. But if Munster and Ives are right, this rally might just be the warm-up act.
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Great Job Moz Farooque & the Team @ TheStreet Source link for sharing this story.
