Trump Bought Up to $5 Million of Nvidia Stock — Then OK’d AI Export Deals That Sent Shares Soaring

For years, Washington treated advanced AI chips like strategic weapons. The U.S. tightened export controls, China accelerated domestic chipmaking, and companies caught in the middle — especially Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA | NVDA Price Prediction) — watched billions of dollars in potential revenue sit behind regulatory walls. 

Now the story has taken a twist few investors saw coming. President Donald Trump revealed millions of dollars in stock trades during the first quarter, including a sizable position in Nvidia, just before reports surfaced that the U.S. approved exports of the chipmaker’s advanced H200 AI processors to Chinese firms. 

The timing raises a straightforward question investors can’t ignore: where does policy end and personal financial interest begin?

3,642 Trades and One Very Interesting Name on the List

President Trump recently filed an OGE Form 278-T with the Office of Government Ethics — the financial form required for senior government officials. The numbers inside it are hard to look away from. In Q1 alone, Trump made 3,642 stock trades. Among those, 36 transactions fell in the $1 million to $5 million range. Another 45 transactions landed between $500,000 and $1 million.

One of those 36 larger trades was for Nvidia. That means Trump holds somewhere between $1 million and $5 million in NVDA stock while serving as president.

A China Trip That Moved Markets

Trump just flew to Beijing this week to meet with President Xi. He brought a delegation that included some of the most powerful CEOs in American business, but only two of them rode with him on Air Force One: Tesla‘s (NASDAQ:TSLA) Elon Musk and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang. Notably, Huang was a late addition to the manifest — when Air Force One stopped in Alaska to refuel, Huang boarded.

Interestingly, on the first day of the trip, the U.S. government reportedly approved the sale of Nvidia’s advanced H200 chips to approximately 10 Chinese companies, including Alibaba (NYSE:BABA), JD.com (NASDAQ:JD), ByteDance, and Lenovo. These chips had been explicitly banned from export to China under previous export controls.

Nvidia’s stock rose more than 4% yesterday, pushing its market cap above $5.7 trillion.

A $50 Billion Market — and a Clear Conflict

Let’s be direct about why this matters to investors. Before export controls took hold, China represented 13% of Nvidia’s revenue — and that share was climbing. Reopening China’s market to H200 chips could unlock what analysts estimate is a $50 billion opportunity for Nvidia.

That’s obviously massive potential for the AI chipmaker. And the president who just approved those sales owns up to $5 million of the stock that benefits from them.

Many U.S. businesses had actively opposed giving Chinese firms access to these advanced chips, citing the competitive threat that comes when companies like Alibaba and ByteDance can run frontier AI workloads. That opposition didn’t stop the approval.

However, it’s not a done deal. Beijing quickly moved the chips under additional regulatory scrutiny, effectively freezing the potential sales. China has been pushing its own domestic chipmakers and has its own concerns about security risks — mirroring, in some ways, the U.S. approach to banning Chinese tech companies from American markets.

Key Takeaway

For Nvidia shareholders, the China approval is a tantalizing signal — but Beijing’s freeze is a real brake on near-term revenue. The longer-term picture is what matters: if the $50 billion Chinese market reopens in any meaningful way, Nvidia’s growth trajectory changes materially.

For everyone else, the picture is harder to shake: A president with up to $5 million in Nvidia stock who flew its CEO to China on Air Force One and — on day one of the trip — oversaw the chip sales that sent Nvidia shares soaring 4%. 

Savvy investors should watch the geopolitical tape here as closely as the earnings print — because right now, the two are running on the same reel.