Nvidia Earnings Don’t Matter This Time

Currently, option traders are betting that Nvidia’s (NASDAQ: NVDA | NVDA Price Prediction) market cap could rise or fall by $355 billion based on earnings. Nvidia’s current market cap is $5.3 trillion. The stock is up 18% so far this year, compared to the S&P 500, which is up 7%.

Nvidia has signaled to Wall St. what investors should expect from earnings. It has forecast the figure for the quarter to be announced today at $78 billion, plus or minus 2%. And it said investors should assume that revenue from China will not be included in the calculation.

Investors may also use the revenue from the previous quarter as a guide. It rose 73% year over year to $68.1 billion.

Investors should not read too much into Nvidia’s new numbers. The AI industry is in a state of flux that Nvidia cannot control. Delays in data center construction are beyond its control. The pace of success of products from companies such as OpenAI and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) can’t be calculated. All of this is to say, Nvidia could have a slow quarter that immediately picks up for the rest of the year. It would have a home run quarter that slows for the rest of 2026. The AI market is not fickle, but advances are uneven.

People who own stock in super-AI tech companies should view their holdings as they would Nvidia’s numbers. Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), which was considered a loser in the AI market, saw its share price underperform early in the year. It has exploded upward since early April and is now up 12% for the year. Microsoft did modestly well at the start of the year. The stock is now down 14% for the year. Because of its once-strong deal with OpenAI, it was supposed to be the big AI winner.

All of this is to say that the massive business fluctuations and the rapid advances in AI features undermine the ability to predict the effects over the next few months, or even years–beyond any reasonable analysis.

None of this is to say that Nvidia will not be at the center of the AI revolution. Its position in the chip market makes it the arms merchant to the sector. It is on a steep climb, but the climb will be uneven.