Stocks Struggle on Nvidia Whiplash After Jensen Huang Resigns
European and Asian shares mostly fell on Friday, November 13, 2026, after Nvidia said CEO Jensen Huang had resigned. Nvidia closed down 4.3% on Thursday, while rival AMD rose 5.9%. Higher oil prices added pressure as Brent crude topped $96 a barrel.
European and Asian shares mostly fell on Friday, November 13, 2026, as stocks struggle on Nvidia whiplash following the resignation of Jensen Huang as the chipmaker's chief executive. Nvidia shares closed down 4.3% on Thursday in the United States.
Nvidia said Huang had stepped down as president, chief executive and board member with immediate effect. The announcement followed reports of two affairs, including one with a woman suspected of spying for China, which raised US national security concerns. Chief financial officer Colette Kress, a long-serving executive, became interim CEO.
How markets moved
In Europe, London's FTSE 100 opened down 0.2%. The benchmark indices in Paris and Frankfurt were each down 0.3%. US stock futures, including the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100, edged lower.
On Thursday, the S&P 500, the Nasdaq Composite and the Dow Jones Industrial Average each fell about 0.4%. The Dow closed at 52,297.09. Some Nvidia rivals gained, including Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), which rose 5.9%.
Asia was split. Japan's Nikkei 225 closed up 0.5% at 61,142.35. South Korea's Kospi fell 1.0% to 5,290.53, and Shanghai's Composite lost 0.6% to 3,634.35. Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down more than 1.5% at 23,637.60 at around 09:00 GMT.
Taiwan's Taiex rose 1.35% to 43,675.12, with TSMC up 0.43%. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 closed down 0.7% at 9,082.20.
Chip stocks mixed
In Tokyo, Tokyo Electron rose 1.7%, while Kioxia fell 2.2% and SoftBank Group, an investor in OpenAI, lost 5.1%. In Seoul, Samsung Electronics fell 1.0% and SK Hynix dropped 3.2%. Many AI hardware stocks across Asia depend heavily on the pace of AI infrastructure spending in the US.
Huang co-founded Nvidia and was a key architect of its AI strategy. Some in the industry saw him as bigger than the company itself.
Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot, said he does not expect any short-term impact on the company, provided its order book stays strong and it keeps meeting its performance targets. He warned of a longer-term risk: "What this news threatens to do is harm the wider AI ecosystem in the longer term."
Oil, gold and currencies
Oil added to the pressure. US President Donald Trump said on Thursday the US didn't "need a deal with Iran" while the Middle East conflict drags on. Brent crude rose 0.7% to $96.48 a barrel around 07:00 GMT, against roughly $72 before the Iran war began in late February. West Texas Intermediate, the US benchmark, gained 0.2% to $88.91.
US December gold futures edged up to $3,899.00 a troy ounce in European morning trade.
The euro rose to $1.1061 from $1.1055 on Thursday. Sterling slipped to $1.3229 from $1.3235, and the dollar eased to 159.79 yen from 159.84 yen.
