Nvidia dethrones Apple as the world's most valuable company

• Nvidia briefly surpassed Apple as the world's most valuable company on Friday with a $3.53 trillion valuation.
• Nvidia's rise has been fueled by its AI-enabling GPUs, boosting its market value by $3.1 trillion since the release of ChatGPT.

Nvidia briefly eclipsed Apple to become the world's most valuable company on Friday.

It's the first time Nvidia has been the world's largest company since mid-June.

Nvidia stock jumped as much as 3% on Friday to an intra-day high of $144.13, catapulting its market valuation to $3.53 trillion. In contrast, Apple traded up less than 1%, giving it a market valuation of $3.52 trillion.

Nvidia stock has since pared its gains to about 1% and is trading neck-and-neck with Apple's valuation, at $3.52 trillion compared to Apple's $3.53 trillion at 1:24 p.m., according to data from YCharts.

The massive size of Nvidia is a testament to its quick ascent since OpenAI released its first version of ChatGPT in November 2022.

Since then, shares of Nvidia, which supplies the technology world with AI-enabling GPU chips, have added $3.1 trillion to their market valuation, with their stock price soaring more than 740%.

Wall Street believes the gains can continue, with some analysts expecting the stock to eclipse a $4 trillion valuation soon.

Bank of America analysts raised their Nvidia price target to $190 last week, citing strong upside and a "generational opportunity" as it grows its lead in the AI space.

Meanwhile, CFRA Research analyst Angelo Zino bumped his price target to $160 as an "AI war" takes place among the major cloud companies.

"The higher multiple and target reflect our higher conviction that NVDA will post results that exceed our/consensus views in CY 25, as Blackwell ramps. As we previously cited, Blackwell will take greater wallet share from hyperscalers (e.g., greater GPU, CPU, networking, and software revenue) amid an AI war in the cloud," Zino wrote.

All eyes will be on Nvidia when they report their third-quarter earnings results next month.