Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, lost his place among the 10 richest people in the world after the heavy drop in the company's stock. The ouster coincided with the opening of an independent board investigation into reports that Huang was a target of Chinese intelligence operations. Huang admitted to having an extramarital affair, but was not charged with a crime or passing classified information. The claim regarding the connection of the woman in question with the Chinese intelligence apparatus was not independently confirmed and the Chinese Foreign Ministry rejected it.
According to Forbes estimates, Huang lost $8.6 billion of his fortune on Tuesday; A day later his fortune dropped by $7.4 billion. His fortune reached about 146.8 billion dollars and dropped four places in two days and was placed in 12th place. With some of Nvidia's share value rebounding on Wednesday, his fortune rose again to about $151.2 billion, and as of the evening of Nov. 11, he was No. 11 on the Forbes Momentum list.
The decline in Huang's fortune is directly related to Nvidia's stock price, as he owns more than 3.5% of the company. Nvidia shares fell 5.6% at one point on Tuesday, bringing the company's market value to about $4.06 trillion; A significant gap from the $5.7 trillion peak on October 2nd.
Nvidia's board launched an independent investigation into the matter and announced that it had no reason to believe that US national security or company secrets had been compromised. Huang also said he would cooperate with that investigation.
At the same time, a proposed class action lawsuit was filed by shareholders against Nvidia and Huang, accusing them of hiding important information from investors. Donald Trump also said the FBI is investigating the matter, although the details and scope of that investigation are unclear.