Let me tell you something the mainstream financial world doesn't like to admit: no competitive advantage lasts forever.
Not even Nvidia's.
Jensen Huang knows this. And unlike 90% of big tech CEOs living in a fantasy world fueled by press releases and applause from sell-side analysts, the guy has skin in the game. He founded the company. He wears a leather jacket to tech conferences like he's Neo from The Matrix — and honestly, in the semiconductor universe, he kind of is.
The illusion of invincibility
Nvidia became the market's darling for a legitimate reason: it dominated the GPU market for artificial intelligence with a brutal combination of hardware + software (CUDA) that created a real competitive moat. This isn't hype. It's decades of engineering.
But here's the thing the YouTube cheerleaders won't tell you: Intel and AMD aren't dead. Wounded, yes. Intel looks like that fighter in round 8 who's taken way too many hits but is still standing. AMD, under Lisa Su, is smarter — it's the Rocky Balboa of this story, getting punched but learning every round.
Jensen is preparing investors for the obvious: the competition is coming back with a vengeance.
And that's healthy, dammit.
Why is the CEO saying this now?
Think about it. When a CEO who's sitting on top of the world starts talking about a "renewed battle" with competitors, he's doing one of two things:
- Managing expectations — because he knows today's obscene margins aren't sustainable forever
- Motivating the internal team — because complacency is the silent cancer that kills dominant companies
Probably both.
Warren Buffett once said: "Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked." The AI tide is still rising, and everyone looks fully clothed. But Jensen, unlike the LinkedIn gurus selling you courses on "how to invest in AI," understands cycles. He lived through Nvidia's near-death experience in the 2000s. He knows what it tastes like to almost lose everything.
The real chessboard
Look at what's happening behind the scenes:
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Intel is investing billions in its own foundry and trying to claw its way back into the AI chip game. Pat Gelsinger is out, the company is in deep restructuring, but there's one thing nobody can take away: manufacturing scale and U.S. government contracts. The CHIPS Act is throwing money their way.
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AMD is attacking the data center market with MI300 chips and gaining real ground. Lisa Su is no amateur — she turned a company on the brink of bankruptcy into a serious contender.
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Startups and big techs like Google (TPU), Amazon (Trainium/Inferentia), and even Microsoft are developing custom chips to reduce their dependency on Nvidia.
Jensen sees all of this. And instead of doing what mediocre CEOs do — pretending the competition doesn't exist — he puts his cards on the table.
This reminds me of what Nassim Taleb says about antifragility: systems that get stronger under stress. Nvidia under competitive pressure tends to innovate faster. Nvidia without pressure tends to get fat and slow. Jensen prefers the first option.
What this means for your wallet
If you've got Nvidia in your portfolio, don't panic. But don't be an idiot either.
The investment thesis for Nvidia was never "they'll dominate without competition forever." If that's what you thought, you didn't do your homework. The real thesis is: they have the best combination of hardware, software, and ecosystem, and they're reinvesting aggressively to maintain that position.
But maintaining a position is different from guaranteeing one.
Benjamin Graham, the father of value investing, taught something simple: margin of safety. What's your margin of safety if AMD starts eating 15-20% of the AI GPU market over the next two years? What if Intel comes back from the dead? What if custom chips from big tech reduce demand?
Did you run those numbers, or did you just buy because you saw it on TikTok?
Jensen Huang is warning you that the war isn't over. The question is: are you going to listen to the guy with skin in the game, or are you going to keep listening to the analyst who's never risked a penny of his own money?
The answer says more about you than it does about Nvidia.
