Key Highlights

● Colette Kress has run Nvidia's finances through its biggest growth stretch.

● Market voices discussed whether she could run the company.

● Any such role would be at least temporary.

● The talk followed reports about CEO Jensen Huang.

Colette Kress has run Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA)'s finances through the most explosive growth stretch in the chipmaker's history. By Thursday morning, a growing number of market voices were openly discussing whether she could soon be asked to run the whole company, at least for a while.

The speculation follows a report on Wednesday evening that Nvidia's board was preparing to decide whether to remove CEO Jensen Huang. None of the allegations surrounding Huang, and no Leadership change, had been independently confirmed as of early Thursday, and reports said, that the board met Wednesday without announcing a final decision. Nvidia did not respond to a request for comment.

Who is being named, and by whom

Reports described Kress, Nvidia's chief financial officer, as an early contender in any succession scenario. One investor went further in a post on Nov. 11, saying he expected Kress to be named interim CEO and that Huang could announce a departure as soon as the following morning. That is one investor's expectation, not a company statement. Separately, reports said that Nvidia was working with an outside firm to identify a potential successor.

The board announced an independent investigation on Nov. 8, and reports said Nvidia hired the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to conduct it. The reports at the center of the probe concern Huang's alleged personal relationships, including one with a woman that US intelligence reportedly believes is a Chinese spy. The board said Sunday it had no reason to believe national security or company secrets were compromised.

Why a finance chief in the top Job reads differently

For shareholders, an interim CEO drawn from the finance side would likely signal continuity in execution, guidance and Capital discipline rather than a change in product strategy. A CFO knows the order book, supplier commitments and customer contracts in granular detail, which can steady investors during an Earnings season. Nvidia's fiscal third-quarter results are due Nov. 17 after the bell, and the person delivering the outlook on that call will be scrutinized closely.

The harder question is vision. Huang co-founded Nvidia and is widely credited with steering it into accelerated computing and AI. Morgan Stanley, which removed Nvidia as a Top Pick under its stop-loss policy while keeping an Overweight rating and a $300 target, said Huang's leadership is "crucial to the company's strategic direction." Analysts at Yorkville Ives estimated, as a hypothetical, that a Huang departure could cut Nvidia's Market Value by about 25%.

Stifel now treats a Huang exit as its base case. It kept a Buy rating but cut its target to $205 from $315, valuing the stock at 13 times estimated fiscal 2028 earnings of $15.65, down from a 20 times multiple. Bernstein's Stacy Rasgon downgraded to Market Perform with a $200 target, and William Blair and Oppenheimer also downgraded on Thursday.

The counter-case and what to watch

Some argue the market has already priced in a good deal of leadership risk. Reports said more than $430 billion of market value was erased in the two-day selloff, and Nvidia was indicated down roughly 6% to 7% before the bell Thursday and other outlets. Baird, in a downgrade earlier in the week, titled its note "Icarus' Rise and Fall; Company Will Be Fine." That investor has pointed to a valuation of about 11 times forward 2026 earnings.

Others caution that an interim arrangement could prolong uncertainty. A securities class action filed Nov. 9 in the Northern District of California names both Nvidia and Huang. Huang also holds about 3.6% of the company.

Investors will watch for any board statement, an 8-K filing, and the tone of the Nov. 17 earnings call, where Options were pricing a move of about 7.8% as of Wednesday's session.