Nvidia disclosed on Friday that its stake in Elon Musk's SpaceX was worth about $21 billion at the end of the second quarter, revealing for the first time the scale of a windfall that began with an investment in the AI startup xAI, CNBC reported on August 14, 2026.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the chipmaker said it owns 122.8 million Class A shares in the rocket maker, which held its public market debut in June in a record IPO. The shares' value has already slipped alongside the stock: SpaceX closed at $140 on Friday, down from $170.86 at the end of June, putting Nvidia's current holding at roughly $17.2 billion. For readers tracking the money flows reshaping the AI economy, AI Buzz Wire covers every major financing disclosure as it lands.

From xAI bet to SpaceX fortune

The path to the stake was indirect. According to a person familiar with the matter who spoke to CNBC, Nvidia's SpaceX shares came from its $10 billion investment in Musk's xAI, part of a $20 billion round in January. SpaceX then acquired xAI in February in a deal valued at $1.25 trillion, converting Nvidia's AI startup bet into a position in the combined aerospace and AI conglomerate.

Based on data from FactSet, Nvidia is now the sixth biggest investor in SpaceX. Musk remains by far the largest owner with a stake worth about $850 billion, while Alphabet is second at roughly $78 billion.

Second only to Intel

The SpaceX position is Nvidia's second largest holding, behind only its stake in Intel. That Intel position is currently worth about $22 billion, down from $30 billion when the quarter ended — still a massive return on Nvidia's $5 billion investment less than a year ago, as CNBC noted. Bloomberg, which also reported the figures, put the Intel holding at $30 billion at quarter's end before the chipmaker's stock decline.

Together, the two stakes mean Nvidia is sitting on more than $40 billion in publicly disclosed equities tied to the AI supply chain, a book that swamps the investment arms of most chipmakers and rivals the strategic portfolios of the largest tech conglomerates. And the value swings are no longer hypothetical: between the end of June and Friday's close, the SpaceX holding alone shed nearly $4 billion in mark-to-market value, while the Intel stake fell by roughly $8 billion.

The disclosures offer a rare look at how Nvidia has evolved from a component supplier into one of the most aggressive investors in the AI ecosystem it helps power. The company has signed letters of intent with six major financial firms — Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfield, Goldman Sachs and KKR — to mobilize more than $500 billion in third-party capital for AI infrastructure, according to the Financial Times. To make that financing work, Nvidia is guaranteeing up to 25 percent of the residual value of its own chips installed in funded projects.

Musk deepens the Nvidia alliance

The equity ties now run alongside deep commercial ones. On SpaceX's second-quarter earnings call earlier this month, Musk said the company will exclusively use Nvidia's AI chips in its AI data centers and to power its frontier AI models, arguing that Nvidia's GPUs have the "best architecture" for training and inference.

Musk also said he expects SpaceX to receive a "significant allocation" of Nvidia's next-generation Vera Rubin GPUs next year, according to CNBC's account of the call.

Why a chipmaker's balance sheet matters

Critics have warned that Nvidia's web of investments, guarantees and customer commitments creates circular dynamics in which the same dollars inflate demand up and down the AI supply chain. Investor Michael Burry has called hyperscalers' depreciation practices "one of the more common frauds of the modern era," estimating that GPU depreciation would be understated by roughly $176 billion between 2026 and 2028. Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang counters that chips like the A100 remain in commercial use six years after launch and that rising rental prices prove long economic lifespans.

The SpaceX stake adds a new dimension to that debate. Nvidia is simultaneously a supplier to SpaceX, a guarantor of projects that buy its chips, and now one of the largest outside shareholders in a company run by its most vocal customer. If SpaceX stock keeps falling — it is down sharply from its June offering price — the mark-to-market swings will land directly on Nvidia's earnings reports.

For now, the filing shows the bet has already paid off many times over. A $10 billion xAI commitment made in January is worth roughly $17 billion to $21 billion seven months later, one of the fastest appreciations in what has become the most closely watched investment book in technology.

The market has noticed the volatility. SpaceX's public debut has become one of the most debated trades of the year, with short-selling analytics firm S3 Partners describing it on CNBC as the "frothiest trade ever" — a label that cuts both ways for shareholders like Nvidia, whose gains depend heavily on where the stock settles after its early swings.

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