
Jim Cramer takes a special look at one of the biggest stock stories of his career: Nvidia. In this episode, Cramer breaks down how the chipmaker went from a niche graphics company to an AI juggernaut—and how he’s tracked the stock along the way. Cramer reflects on what Nvidia's rise means for the market, the future of tech, and the investors who bet big.
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I always liked Nvidia. NVDA is one of the few winners in the PC supply chain. Nvidia. Nvidia. Nvidia. Darn. It deserves the accolades. Nvidia is the one that I've made the most money on. He was early in learning about AI and he was early in recognizing its potential. And then he went and told everybody the story of Nvidia. It's probably 30% of my portfolio and it's worth over a million dollars. We need to analyze why so many people didn't want to buy a stock that tacked on a record $277 billion in one day, eclipsing a record formerly held by Meta for the largest single session gain in stock market history. First, let's just say I did my best to get you in it. I've been recommending Nvidia endlessly off multiple times a week, both here and in the club, for a decade now. I knew early on that I had the fastest, by far the fastest processors, much faster than traditional computing because one of my old hedge fund clients was on the board of intel back in the day. Was always upset that intel refused to get into the speedy graphics processing unit business. But then CEO Andy Grove bridled the thought because back then gaming chips were considered low end and not good for much of anything beyond pretty video game graphics. They were cheap, they were cheesy, that were worthless to him. Meanwhile, there were early adopters away from the video games though. Companies like Audi North America that told me Nvidia's chips were so much faster than Intel's and everybody else's that it wasn't even a competition to see who should put the chips into the Audis. Oh, I pursued the Nvidia story aggressively and after that I came to you with the idea immediately. For years I've told you that even though Nvidia seemed expensive, the stock would always end up looking cheap in retrospect because the actual earnings would be much higher than expected. I documented this time and time again. Yet for ages, nobody seemed to catch on. Then you know what? Finally I got so darn fed up with my inability to get people's attention to buy the stock that I just renamed my darn dog Nvidia. In a blatant gambit to sell you on this amazing company unlike any other company in the top five for more than 20 years. Two things distinguish in video. One, hardly anybody knows if they ever used an Nvidia product as it's really part of the hidden tech world known as the enterprise. On the consumer side, only hardcore gamers care about these chips. And two, we know Nvidia will soon overtake Microsoft keeps up this pace. Or as Chat GPT, the spawn of Microsoft on the software side and Nvidia on the hardware side told me today to estimate when Nvidia might surpass Microsoft as the largest company, we need to consider Nvidia's growth rate. ChatGPT goes on to say Nvidia could potentially pass Microsoft within the next year or two. To which I say, hold it, partner. Nvidia. Own it, don't trade it. That's been my Advice. For about $3.7 trillion in market capitalization, Nvidia became the first $4 trillion company. And it's hard not to celebrate the success of this business or the man behind it, Jensen Wong, who has truly changed the world, your world. It's a big deal to hit $4 trillion. Before I get into anything else, let me just say this. Jensen Wong is like no other executive I've ever met. I've met a lot of when he was in his formative years, Jensen worked at Denny's as a busboy, dishwasher. All those other jobs we don't ever want to do, even if, like me, we did them. I know it seems preposterous, but Jensen impresses me as someone who still acts like he works, working at Denny's, still trying to do a great job, still being respectful and kind and helpful, still trying to get ahead. As for the $4 trillion mark, Jensen doesn't have time to celebrate. It's not going to stop that would be hubris. This man is no hubris. Instead, he has two qualities that are in very short supply these days anywhere. His graciousness and gratitude. The graciousness is an exact counter to pomposity and arrogance. He doesn't have any of those qualities either. The gratitude. It's to those who believe in him, to the shareholders, to those who stuck with him, to those who held on through thick and thin. For Jensen, this is just another day of getting up at 4am, doing all the work he has to do, and then spending 8am on with his teammates at Nvidia. When you're with him in the company's headquarters, he seems to know everyone by name. Everyone wants to have a selfie with him. He always seems to watch. I'm not allowed in headquarters unescorted. But my late dog Everest, the one I renamed in video, well, he was. I renamed him that many years ago because I couldn't get anyone to buy the torn stock. Can you imagine that? Jensen appreciated the gesture. Now, let's talk about this. $4 trillion cheap. Let's put in perspective. In the last 25 years, only four companies have earned the title of the biggest public company in America. Microsoft, General Electric, ExxonMobil and Apple. GE wore the crown twice, Microsoft five times, ExxonMobil seven and Apple an astounding 11 times. Hallowed ground, of course. GE imploded not long after. Too much leverage. ExxonMobil. Oil prices shot up and Exxon was the biggest company in the industry at that time. But the two that still rival Nvidia, Microsoft and Apple. I think that's the most telling part of this story. Apple took top honors because it has the best smartphone in the world. It's something that at one time everyone wanted, including China. Therein lies the complication that will likely keep Apple from toppling in video before the cement rise, much to everyone's chagrin. Apple's in the doghouse with the Trump administration and they might not get out of it until they start making iPhones here. That said, Apple can still get right back to the horse race, but it will take more and better AI products. It needs a new hit too. That doesn't mean you should give up on it. For me, Apple remains and own it. Don't trade its stock. That's the status it deserves as long as it keeps making the phones with the highest customer satisfaction. But I don't see it taking that crown back from Nvidia anytime soon. How about Microsoft? It's doing incredibly well. Microsoft's the software king. It's the top cloud services play. It's the number one gaming company. It's embraced AI with abundance. According to a Bloomberg article today, Microsoft claims to have saved $500 million in its call centers while increasing customer and employee satisfaction. But the fact is, neither Microsoft nor Apple can claim that they're currently creating a new industrial revolution like in video can. In fairness, they did create the last industrial revolution, the rise of the personal computer. Well, that was a long time ago. Just a few years ago, Nvidia was a company that made incredibly fast semiconductors that improved the quality of video games. Nice business and not earth shattering. Jensen envisioned so much more though. He knew that AI would transform everything and his chips allowed AI to work. You could ask his chips questions and they could generate answers. Generative AI generic. I searched for the superlatives of this extraordinary achievement. Here. How about this? Every single computer with a GPU that's not as good as Nvidia is obsolete. Or a CPU for that matter. The users just don't know it. Everything needs to be replaced. His chips and the software that comes with them allow companies to do breathtaking things. They enable self driving cars. They enable humanoid robots. Right now Jensen wants them to do the three Ds that's are the dirty, the dangerous and the dull jobs. They'll no doubt do far more than that, replacing white collar jobs of all kinds. And Jensen likes to explain that every other industrial revolution created many more jobs than were lost. Which is true, although the new jobs don't necessarily pay as much as the opens. Some analysts saw this coming. Ben Reitzers familiars Mellius can show you piece after piece where he said that in video is going to overtake all companies. And he kept on the beat that software along the most beloved part of tech, would be overturned by hardware in terms of its importance and size in the market, including video. He's been dead right. Congrats to Ben for taking the radical position that hardware could exceed software in value and Nvidia would lead that charge. But most analysis emphatically did not see this coming. Nvidia was repeatedly misjudged as a parvenu, a one trick pony, if not a flash in the pan. Jensen was never to be considered a goat, let alone the goat because he was from the hardware side, nothing more. Each great quarter supposed to be the last one. Each customer is supposed to be working on something better. Each iteration was supposed to be too expensive versus what it provided. Endless doubt, no belief. One day we'd wake up and see that Microsoft or Meta Or Outfit or Amazon or Chinese company, we'd have something better. There's even been some playful skepticism all along, especially from my squawk of the street partner, David Faber. Hey, if Nvidia is so great, Jim, then why is the stock down? Because it's up 80, David. It's been up 80%, okay? Because they're not splitting the stock. I'm going to get a split. That's what I'll do here. I promise. I'll get you a split of Nvidia stock. How's that? But we got the split. But the competition hasn't got a video. You know why? Because Jensen wakes up before the other guy and works harder than the other guy to make sure the video stays on top. That's how you get to $4 trillion. Just how great is in video? Let me pay it the highest compliment that I can. That I can. In a country right now, we're in a cold war with China. They want to choke us. We want to choke them. As the President would say, who has the cards? The problem is, we seem to want everything from China. So the President has to tariff the heck out of this stuff to make it uncompetitive. The Chinese, though, they seem to want only one thing from us. They want Nvidia chips. Not even the best ones. And you know what? They're right to covet them. These chips hold the key to the new industrial revolution. Sometimes Nvidia seems like our only bargaining chip with China. But it's a big one. Bigger than anything they have. We've got the cards because Nvidia makes the cards. We have the cards because of Jensen Wong. But he's so darn humble that he'll never point this out. Guys like me have to. Bottom line, Nvidia. Own it, don't trade it. Oh, and see you at $5 trillion. Let's go to Roger in Florida. Roger. Hey, J.C. congrats on 20 years and a big booyah. Thank you, thank you, thank you. It's been an incredible ride. So many unforgettable moments. We're talking 4,000 shows and still counting. But none of it would have been possible without the ridiculously talented team supporting the show. I've had the privilege of working with the absolute best in the business. My executive producer, Regina Gilligan, my head writer and only writer, my sister's kid, Cliff Mason, and the entire Mad Money staff. And of course, nothing would be possible without the studio crew, editors, graphic artists, and everyone else behind the scenes. It's no secret that I love seeing fly eagles fly, but I've always viewed Mad Money as the ultimate team sport. The success this show has achieved over the last 20 years could not have happened without this team. So to each and every one of you and all all the Mad Money fans out there, I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. Booyah. When work gets crazy, I like to stop by the bar after, have a few cold ones. I don't drink at all until 4 o'. Clock. We limit ourselves to one bottle of wine a night. Excessive drinking has a way of sneaking up on us. A few drinks, a few nights a week, it can add up and suddenly we're at greater risk for long term problems like heart disease, cancer and depression. Reason enough to rethink the drink more at rethinktodrink. Com. NOHA Initiative.
Episode: Cramer’s 20th Anniversary Special: Nvidia’s Rise to the Top
Date: August 26, 2025
Host: Jim Cramer (CNBC)
This special 20th anniversary episode of “Mad Money” celebrates Nvidia’s meteoric rise to a $4 trillion market cap, examining why the company stands apart from every other tech titan and how Jim Cramer’s prescient and persistent advocacy for Nvidia anticipated one of the greatest stock runs in Wall Street history. It’s a tribute to Nvidia, its visionary CEO Jensen Huang, and Cramer’s own philosophy about winning investment strategies—and a milestone look at the past, present, and future of technology investing.
Long-Term Advocacy:
Cramer highlights his decade-long campaign encouraging viewers to buy Nvidia stock, recognizing its transformative AI-driven potential before the mainstream market caught on.
Early Insights from Industry Connections:
Cramer’s hedge fund background provided him with early access to rumors and industry frustrations—specifically how Intel overlooked the power of GPUs, opening the door for Nvidia.
General Skepticism & Stigma:
Despite its steady outperformance, Wall Street long dismissed Nvidia as an expensive, niche play—underestimating the hardware revolution underway.
Nvidia’s ‘Hidden’ Success:
Nvidia operates in the enterprise space, largely invisible to mainstream consumers except for hardcore gamers, further lowering its profile.
Relentlessness in Advocacy:
Cramer’s passion led him to unconventional methods to draw attention, even renaming his dog to stress his conviction.
Exclusive Club of Giants:
Only four companies in 25 years have held America’s largest public company title: Microsoft, GE, ExxonMobil, and Apple. Nvidia’s presence marks a shift.
What Distinguishes Nvidia:
Unlike Apple or Microsoft, Nvidia is seen as creating a new industrial revolution powered by AI and advanced chips.
Nvidia vs. American Tech Icons:
Cramer analyzes rivals:
Apple - needs a new AI breakthrough to retake the crown
Microsoft - dominant in software & cloud, but now hardware (Nvidia) is king
Background & Values:
Jensen's humble beginnings (worked at Denny’s) and tireless work ethic set him apart from typical tech moguls.
Culture & Character:
Jensen’s humility, graciousness, and gratitude are rare and instrumental to Nvidia’s success.
From Gaming to Everything:
Once dismissed as makers of “cheesy” gaming chips, Nvidia’s GPUs are now foundational for AI, self-driving cars, robotics, and beyond.
Market Skepticism & Vindication:
Most analysts and investors failed to see this hardware revolution, but a minority—like Ben Reitzes—correctly predicted hardware overtaking software.
Competition and Staying Power:
Cramer praises Nvidia’s staying power, relentless innovation, and chip dominance, even as rivals try to catch up.
Iconic Advice:
True to form, Cramer doubles down on his mantra:
Acknowledgement of the Team:
On the 20-year milestone, Cramer thanks his production crew and fans.
On Nvidia’s Superiority:
“Every single computer with a GPU that’s not as good as Nvidia is obsolete.” – Jim Cramer (22:08)
On Jensen Huang:
“This man is no hubris. Instead, he has two qualities that are in very short supply these days anywhere: his graciousness and gratitude.” – Jim Cramer (13:12)
On Hardware Upending Software’s Dominance:
“Congrats to Ben for taking the radical position that hardware could exceed software in value, and Nvidia would lead that charge.” – Jim Cramer (24:15)
On Global Geopolitics:
“Sometimes Nvidia seems like our only bargaining chip with China. But it’s a big one. Bigger than anything they have.” – Jim Cramer (29:40)
On Long-term Investing:
“Nvidia. Own it, don’t trade it.” – Jim Cramer (multiple times, including 10:05 and 31:02)
The episode balances Cramer’s signature high-energy, no-nonsense style with deep admiration for Nvidia and its CEO. The retrospective is celebratory and assertive, with a heavy dose of “I told you so”—tempered by humility, gratitude, and encouragement for retail investors to stick with secular winners rather than chase quick profits.
Cramer’s advice is unwavering: Nvidia is both a hold and a symbol of American leadership and innovation for the next generation. The 20th anniversary puts his career—and consistent calls—into historical perspective, encouraging listeners to trust long-term vision over myopic skepticism.