- Nvidia’s board is investigating CEO Jensen Huang after he admitted to an affair.
- US media report the woman, who worked at Megaspeed, was a Chinese intelligence asset.
- The claims are unproven publicly, and China denies them.
Nvidia’s board has opened an independent investigation into its founder and CEO, Jensen Huang, after he admitted to an affair with a woman that US media report was a Chinese intelligence asset. The claims first surfaced in a New York Times report on October 29. They are unproven publicly, China rejects them, and Nvidia says nothing suggests its secrets were compromised.
The story stretches back more than two years, to a US probe of one of Nvidia’s customers. It also lands as Nvidia leans harder into Europe: on October 13, Huang said in Paris that it would announce $2 billion in new European AI deals.
Timeline: how the story unfolded
- June 2024: The Times reported that Alice Huang, an executive at Singapore-based cloud infrastructure firm Megaspeed, was photographed beside Jensen Huang at a party in Taipei. The two are not related.
- October 9, 2025: The Times reported that the US Commerce Department was investigating Megaspeed over claims it routed Nvidia chips to China, and that Singapore police were also looking at the company.
- About a year ago: US intelligence officials briefed President Donald Trump on the matter, the Times later reported. He took no further action, according to the paper. The Justice Department took over the Megaspeed probe in 2026.
- May 2026: Trump travelled to Beijing for a summit with Xi Jinping. Huang was among the technology leaders who joined the trip.
- October 13: In Paris, Huang said Nvidia would announce $2 billion in new European AI deals on top of about $8 billion it says it has invested in the region over the past year, as TFN reported.
- October 29: The Times reported that US intelligence agencies concluded Alice Huang passed information to Beijing while building a close relationship with Huang. Nvidia said his interactions with her were “not unusual or unexpected”.
- October 31: Trump said the US was looking “very closely” at the report and called Huang “very above board.”
- November 5: Three House committee chairs asked Huang for a closed-door briefing, proposing November 18, in a request first reported by Axios.
- November 7: The Financial Times reported that a US intelligence memo said Huang and Alice Huang were romantically involved.
- November 8: Huang told employees he had been unfaithful to his wife. Nvidia’s board announced an independent investigation, according to CBS News.
- November 9: Trump said he believed the FBI was looking into the matter “in terms of something else”, and that Huang had told him he had “absolutely no idea” the woman was a spy, according to Bloomberg and Al Jazeera. China’s Foreign Ministry rejected the reports as a smear. Nvidia shares fell about 4%.
Who is involved and what is alleged
Alice Huang, also reported as Huang Le, worked as an executive at Megaspeed. The Times reported that US officials believe she was an asset of China’s Ministry of State Security. The Financial Times reported that officials believed her task was to gather information on Huang, including by pushing him to argue for looser limits on chip exports to China. She has no relation to Jensen Huang. She has not commented publicly, and the FT said it could not reach her.
Megaspeed was spun out of a Chinese gaming company in 2023. Trade data cited by the Times indicates that a Malaysia-linked company associated with Megaspeed bought at least $4.8 billion of Nvidia equipment between June 2024 and February 2026. Megaspeed has faced questions over whether chips were diverted to China.
Nvidia says those claims were “thoroughly investigated and debunked” last year. “We trust that if we were the target of a genuine threat, the U.S. government would have notified us,” Nvidia spokesperson John Rizzo said.
Huang wrote to staff: “I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry.” He did not name the woman and said he would cooperate with the inquiry.
Nvidia’s board said a committee of independent directors, assisted by outside counsel, will run it, and that it had “no reason to believe” national security or Nvidia secrets were compromised. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the matter an “internal corporate matter.”
One point is settled: Huang has confirmed the affair. The spying claims rest on reports citing US officials, and nothing public shows that Nvidia’s confidential information was compromised.
Why Europe is watching
Huang spent much of October pitching Europe. Nvidia puts its total European commitment at close to $10 billion and does not split it between equity stakes and infrastructure. In the same Paris speech, it flagged planned minority stakes in four French startups: Doctolib, Genesis AI, Pigment and Entalpic. Amounts were not disclosed.
Nvidia’s European footprint goes well beyond those four. Trending Topics counted 26 European tech companies Nvidia has backed over three years, including Mistral AI, Wayve, Black Forest Labs, Nscale and ElevenLabs, plus 13 newly announced stakes.
By the publication’s own extrapolation from PitchBook data, Nvidia’s commitments equal roughly a tenth of European tech venture funding in 2026, though check sizes are rarely disclosed.
For European founders and investors, the worry is simple. A leadership crisis could slow Nvidia’s dealmaking, and tighter US scrutiny of its China ties could change how European governments see the company.
What to watch next
The House chairs asked Huang to confirm by November 11 whether he will brief the committees on November 18, one day after Nvidia’s quarterly earnings. The board inquiry has no announced end date, and Washington has given no public sign of how the FBI’s interest affects Huang or Nvidia.
Huang is one of AI’s best-known figures and has argued for keeping some chip sales to China open. The FT reported that he lobbied Trump earlier this year to allow exports of Nvidia’s H200 chip. The allegations could strengthen calls for tighter export controls and raise governance questions at a company closely tied to its CEO. Analyst Dan Ives expects Huang to stay for now but warned of a risk he could be removed, depending on what the board finds.
Nvidia is also pushing into AI financing, including agreements with six asset managers to mobilise more than $500 billion in third-party capital for AI infrastructure. TFN has also covered Nvidia’s position in the AI chip market and how its dominance is being challenged.
If the inquiry clears Huang, does Nvidia’s China exposure still leave it vulnerable in Washington?
