Historic Nvidia’s $150bn Buyback Is a Bet That the AI Boom Will Outlast Its Critics

London, 28 September 2026 — EBM Newsdesk Analysis — By Amr Shabana

On Monday, 28 September, Nvidia said its board had authorised an additional $150bn under its existing share repurchase programme, taking the total remaining to $235bn, which it expects to execute through fiscal year 2028. The company described it as the largest increase in a repurchase authorisation on record. The shares climbed 1.9% on Monday morning, even as the wider tech sector slumped. Nvidia’s financial year ends in late January, so the whole pot could be spent in roughly 16 months. NVIDIA expects to buy back shares under its remaining $235 billion authorization through fiscal 2028. +2

That works out at about $15bn a month if Nvidia uses the full allowance. Buybacks tell you where a company thinks its money earns the best return. Nvidia is saying that, after funding research, chip supply and a growing list of investments in its own customers, the best remaining home for its cash is its own stock. For European investors, many of whom hold Nvidia through global index funds, that is a direct transfer of AI profits back to them. It also sets a benchmark for capital returns that few European technology companies can match.

Why a chipmaker buys its own shares

A buyback is simple. The company uses cash to buy its shares in the market and cancels them. Fewer shares means each remaining one owns a bigger slice of future profits. Earnings per share rise mechanically, but at this scale the real message is confidence. Finwire

Jensen Huang said as much. He said Nvidia’s cash generation lets it invest in the technology behind the AI shift while also returning capital to shareholders, and that the authorisation reflects confidence in the long-term opportunity. Stock Titan

The rise has been fast. Nvidia barely bought back shares in 2020 and 2021. Repurchases then climbed from about $10bn in fiscal 2023 to nearly $34bn in fiscal 2025. The previous corporate benchmark was Apple’s $110bn authorisation in 2024. Nvidia has not just beaten that figure. It has added a further $125bn on top of a programme that already existed. Finwire

The circular money question

There is a less flattering reading. Nvidia is not only buying its own shares. It is also financing the companies that buy its chips. The buyback news followed Nvidia’s $1bn commitment to Nscale’s $3.36bn convertible debt financing. Nscale, the London-based AI cloud builder, spends that kind of money on Nvidia hardware. TheEnergyMag

Critics call this circular. Nvidia sells chips, lends or invests in customers so they can buy more chips, then uses the profits to support its share price. Each step is legal and each makes commercial sense. Taken together, they make the AI economy look more self-reinforcing than it would if outside demand were doing all the work.

The counter-argument is that Nvidia can afford both. A company short of good projects buys back stock to hide it. A company swimming in cash buys back stock because it has more money than even an aggressive investment plan can absorb. The market clearly believes the second story.

What it means for Europe

Europe’s AI ambitions rest heavily on Nvidia’s hardware. Sovereign AI projects, national supercomputers and new data centre campuses from Norway to Portugal all queue for the same chips. Every dollar Nvidia returns to shareholders is a dollar it has decided not to spend on cutting prices or expanding supply faster.

European boards will also feel the pressure. Investors now compare every technology company’s capital returns with Nvidia’s. Firms such as ASML and SAP generate strong cash, but nothing close to this. Asking them to keep pace would mean starving the investment that Europe says it needs.

My Read

This is not a sign that Nvidia has run out of ideas. It is a sign that it has run out of places to put the money. That is a remarkable position for any company to be in. The risk is concentration. When AI demand cools, a company that has spent $235bn on its own shares will have less cushion than one that kept the cash. For now, Huang is betting that demand will not cool. So far, betting against him has been expensive.