Nvidia stock extends its blistering rally to 200%, adding an eye-watering $723 billion in market value as AI frenzy continues

• Nvidia's stunning stock rally has hit a new milestone as the AI frenzy fuels interest in the Santa Clara-based chipmaker.
• The shares have surged 200% this year as investors see the company well-positioned to take advantage of the AI boom.
• The stock jump has seen Nvidia enter the $1 trillion market-cap club, and boosted the wealth of its CEO.

Nvidia's scorching stock rally just hit another milestone.

Shares in the Santa Clara-based chipmaker have extended their 2023 gains to an eye-popping 200% - meaning the price has tripled so far this year. They closed at a record high of $438.08 apiece on Tuesday. The rally has boosted the company's market value by an astounding $723 billion to $1.08 trillion.

The stock surge comes as investors pile into artificial intelligence-related companies including Nvidia, Microsoft and Alphabet following the smashing debut of OpenAI's human-like chatbot ChatGPT. Nvidia, specifically, has drawn fans as it dominates the market for high-intensity computing infrastructure that's required for AI projects.

The semiconductor firm entered the $1 trillion market-cap club for the first time last month, joining a band of other elite companies with sky-high valuations. The stock rally has also pumped up the wealth of the company's CEO Jensen Huang to $39.2 billion, making him the 34th richest person in the world, per the Bloomberg Billionaire's Index.

Morgan Stanley has named Nvidia stock its "top pick" and forecast this week that the company's shares could climb a further 15% from current levels.

Billionaire investor Stanley Druckenmiller, who has snapped up $220 million of Nvidia stock, has said the shares are worth holding onto for the next few years.

The investor excitement over AI has not helped lift tech stocks in general, boosting the Nasdaq 100 index by about 38% so far this year. But that's got some investors worried about a stock rally that may be too narrow to be sustainable, with Big Tech shares largely fueling the rise of US benchmarks indices, including the S&P 500.