Elon Musk said it would be “an honor” to hire Jensen Huang, as Nvidia‘s board met to decide whether to remove its co-founder and Chief Executive Officer over his relationships with a woman U.S. officials suspect of spying for China and with a company executive.
“That would be an honor,” Musk wrote on X on Wednesday evening, replying to a post by user ‘Zero Hedge’ that read: “Elon please hire Jensen.”
Musk, who runs Tesla and SpaceX, did not say what role he had in mind or whether he had spoken to Huang.
The reply came hours after The Wall Street Journal reported that Nvidia’s board was preparing to force Huang out, and minutes after The New York Times reported that he had a romantic relationship with an Nvidia executive. CNBC confirmed late on Wednesday that the board was meeting to decide his future.
About half an hour after his reply, Musk also backed investor Gavin Baker of Atreides Management, who wrote that large shareholders and partners were calling him to say “Nvidia’s board should wait for the results of the investigation before ousting Jensen.” “I agree,” Baker wrote. Musk answered with a “💯” emoji.
A minute later, Musk replied “Exactly” to an earlier Baker post calling for “a shareholder vote after the investigation is complete.”
That post quoted angel investor Jason Calacanis, who wrote that the board should “finish their investigation” and “make @JensenHuang the chairman if it comes to that.”
As of early Thursday, Nvidia had not announced a decision.
A Week of Support
The post is Musk’s most direct comment since the scandal broke, and the latest in a series of posts backing Huang.
On Sunday, hours after Huang admitted to an affair, Musk quoted a post by Shaun Maguire, a partner at venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, and wrote: “I agree.”
Maguire had written that Huang was “one of the greatest entrepreneurs of this generation” who “did something incredibly dumb” that “was bad for America.”
“But my guess is there was no bad intention,” Maguire wrote. “Two mistakes don’t make a right, and I believe Jensen is irreplaceable for America’s AI leadership.”
The Allegations
Huang told Nvidia staff in a note on Sunday that he had been unfaithful to his wife. “I take full responsibility for what I did and the hurt I caused, and I accept the criticism that comes with it,” he wrote, without naming the other person.
“I am committed to protecting NVIDIA and supporting America’s national security,” he added.
The Financial Times had reported that U.S. intelligence believed Huang was in a romantic relationship with Alice Huang, an executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed, which buys Nvidia chips. The two are not related.
The New York Times reported on October 29 that U.S. spy agencies had watched her for about a year, and later that U.S. officials believe she is a spy for China’s Ministry of State Security.
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has called the allegation “purely groundless speculation and an attempt to smear and malign China.” Alice Huang has not commented publicly.
Nvidia’s board said on November 8 that a committee of independent directors, assisted by outside counsel, would investigate reports that Huang had been “the target of a foreign intelligence effort.” It has hired the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to lead the inquiry.
“While the Board has no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised, the Board’s inquiry will examine all available information,” it said, adding that it had “confidence in Jensen and his leadership team.”
“Today’s news will not slow NVIDIA. Jensen is committed to continuing to lead NVIDIA as CEO without interruption,” a company spokesperson said at the time.
Republican chairmen of three House committees have asked Huang to appear before them at a closed-door briefing on November 18. President Donald Trump called him “an honorable guy” on Sunday.
On Monday, Trump said Huang had told him he did not know the woman was a spy. “I know the FBI is looking into it,” Trump said. “I think that he’ll be in good shape.”
Musk’s Nvidia Ties
Musk’s companies are among Nvidia’s largest customers, and Nvidia is a shareholder in SpaceX.
Nvidia disclosed in August that it owned 122.8 million Class A shares of SpaceX at the end of June. The stake came from Nvidia’s investment in Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, which SpaceX acquired in February.
On SpaceX’s second-quarter earnings call in August, Musk said the company would use Nvidia chips exclusively in its AI data centers, citing their “best architecture” for training and running AI models.
He said he expected SpaceX to receive a “significant allocation” of Nvidia’s next-generation Vera Rubin processors next year.
Analysts Weigh a Departure
Nvidia shares closed up 2.9% at $173.73 on Wednesday, then fell more than 9% in after-hours trading following the Journal report. They were down 6.9% at $161.81 in premarket trading on Thursday.
Several analysts addressed Huang’s possible exit in notes on Thursday. Price Target, a sister publication of EV, archives Wall Street analysts’ research on the electric vehicle, artificial intelligence and semiconductor sectors.
Oppenheimer analyst Rick Schafer downgraded Nvidia to ‘Perform’ from ‘Outperform’ and removed his price target. “We see massive shoes to fill and no obvious successor. His departure presents a material, potentially thesis-changing event,” he wrote.
UBS analyst Timothy Arcuri kept a ‘Buy’ rating and $300 target. “While the company would likely find a strong candidate, Jensen has obviously been a singular force in many ways so the impact will likely be felt far and wide,” he wrote. Citi cut its target to $225 from $285 while keeping a ‘Buy’ rating.
Nvidia is due to report quarterly results on Tuesday, November 17.
