Nvidia extends rally after the company announces a four-for-one stock split

• Nvidia stock extended its gains to as much as 7% on Monday.
• The rise came after the company announced a four-for-one stock split on Friday.
• If shareholders approve the split on June 3, there will be 4 billion authorized shares of Nvidia common stock.

Nvidia stock extended its gains to as much as 7% on Monday after the company announced a four-for-one stock split last Friday.

Management said the split will help "make stock ownership more accessible to investors and employees," according to a press release.

The split will increase the number of authorized shares of common stock to 4 billion if it's approved at a shareholder meeting on June 3.

This is Nvidia's first stock split in 14 years.

Nvidia stock is up nearly 20% in the past six months and roughly 80% in the past year, despite a rotation away from highly valued tech shares amid the economic reopening.

Sales of Nvidia's graphic cards have been on fire due to rising PC and cryptocurrency mining demand. The only issue for the company has been an ongoing semiconductor shortage that's made it difficult to keep pace with consumer's growing appetite for high-end GPU's.

As a result of the semiconductor shortage, in February, Nvidia announced that all GeForce RTX 3060 graphics cards would ship with a reduced ethereum hash rate to discourage ether mining and make more supplies available for the company's core gaming audience.

Then on May 18, Nvidia said it would extend the reduced hash rates to its new GeForce RTX 3080, 3070, and 3060 Ti graphics cards that will start shipping before the end of May.

Despite the move to quash mining with its GPUs, supplies for the units are still hard to come by.

Nvidia also recently saw its proposed $40 billion acquisition of the chip-maker Arm called into question when Britain's Digital Secretary, Oliver Dowden, said he was intervening in the sale on national security grounds after considering advice from officials across the investment security community.

Still, Nvidia remains an analyst favorite despite recent bearish news and the ongoing semiconductor shortage. The company boasts 28 "buy" ratings, 10 "hold" or equivalent ratings, and just one "sell" rating from Wall Street.

Nvidia stock traded up 4.41% as of 12:03 p.m. ET on Monday.