Confidence in shares of Nvidia is in question after SoftBank’s decision to relinquish its stake in the high-flying stock. Nvidia briefly tumbled nearly 4% Tuesday after the Japanese investment firm said it zeroed out its position in the AI chipmaker for $5.8 billion. That left investors wondering if SoftBank’s decision to exit the stock was a bad omen for Nvidia’s future stock performance, or if it was simply taking profits on a market leader. “It’s eyebrow raising,” said Jay Woods, chief market strategist at Freedom Capital Markets. NVDA 1D mountain Nvidia, 1-day The sale came after SoftBank said it was pouring resources into OpenAI, the Sam Altman-led startup behind the ChatGPT artificial intelligence bot. But even without directly owning 32 million shares, SoftBank’s fate is still intertwined with the chipmaker given the Japanese company’s work on projects including Stargate that use Nvidia technology. Laying the groundwork SoftBank’s decision should be viewed more as a signal of OpenAI preparing to go public in the near future rather than as red flag for Nvidia’s outlook, Woods said, calling Tuesday’s pullback a healthy move ahead of earnings scheduled to be reported next week. “I don’t think it is a direct shot at Nvidia. I don’t think it’s going to impact the direction they continue to go,” Woods said. “If anything, it gives investors a reason to buy it on t …
