本文探讨了英伟达市值突破4万亿美元这一里程碑事件，并分析了其背后的驱动因素。文章指出，英伟达的成功得益于人工智能模型对高性能GPU的巨大需求，尤其是对新型“推理”模型的需求。同时，文章还对比了英伟达与其他科技巨头的市场价值、利润、资本支出以及员工财富，展现了这些公司在经济上的巨大影响力，并强调了它们对全球经济的潜在影响。

💰 英伟达市值飙升至4万亿美元，接近日本的GDP。这反映了其在科技行业，尤其是在人工智能领域中的主导地位，以及市场对其产品的强烈需求。

💡 人工智能模型的兴起推动了对英伟达GPU及相关设备的需求。特别是新型“推理”模型需要大量的计算资源，进一步增加了对英伟达产品的需求。

☁️ 主要客户为云服务提供商和大型科技公司。例如亚马逊、微软、谷歌和Meta等，它们是英伟达的主要客户，同时也与其存在竞争关系。

💸 科技巨头的财务实力惊人。六家公司（英伟达、苹果、亚马逊、微软、谷歌和Meta）的总市值超过17万亿美元，净利润总额接近5000亿美元，年度资本支出（主要用于AI数据中心）超过3250亿美元。

🧑‍💼 员工财富高度集中。英伟达的3.6万名员工创造了4万亿美元的市值，这反映了科技行业财富的高度集中。

This post originally appeared in the BI Tech Memo newsletter.Sign up for the weekly BI Tech Memo newsletter here.

Nvidia became the first $4 trillion company this week. The moment reminded me of something my tech friend mentioned before he moved to the UK earlier this year: There have never been companies like these.

$4 trillion is the GDP of Japan, according to the World Bank. Nvidia is not far behind Germany, the third-largest economy in the world. This is a single corporation with only about 36,000 employees.

Why is Nvidia so valuable? After a DeepSeek-inspired freakout earlier this year, the industry now thinks AI models probably need even more Nvidia GPUs and related gear. New types of "reasoning" models are especially expensive to run, which means extra demand for Nvidia's wares.

Who buys all this stuff? Mainly cloud providers, such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, along with other Big Tech and AI companies, such as Meta. They also compete with Nvidia, so I call them frenemies. Add up the market value of these four giants and you get to about $10 trillion. Throw Apple and Nvidia into that mix, and you're over $17 trillion — approaching China's GDP. Just from six companies based in two medium-sized urban hubs on the northwest coast of the US.

This compares a "flow" with an asset, so I'm risking a lecture from journalism schools I never attended, but it gives you an idea of the financial heft of these private entities. There are other ways to comprehend their size:

Profit: Yeah, I know, so old-fashioned! The net income of these six companies totalled almost $500 billion in 2024. That's well over half the US annual defense budget.Capex: Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Google will spend about $325 billion this year, mostly on AI data centers. Then there's Project Stargate, involving OpenAI, Oracle, and others, which is investing at least $100 billion. That rivals the (inflation-adjusted) cost of the US Interstate highway system, which took more than three decades to build.Employee wealth: Most of these companies don't employ that many people, relatively speaking. Thirty-six thousand workers and a $4 trillion valuation represent an unprecedented concentration of wealth.

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