Nvidia: 'AI Demand Pull' To Drive 2024 Capex, Analysts See 'Higher Software Monetization' In AI

Zinger Key Points
  • Nvidia's Blackwell GPU outpaces Hopper, eyes $100T GenAI market; Mizuho, BofA, Stifel buoyant with $900+ targets.
  • Nvidia leads with hardware, software synergy in AI; Analysts see over $400B AI revenue by 2027, share prices dip slightly.

Analysts attended Nvidia Corp’s NVDA GTC conference on March 19, which delivered multiple product and partnership announcements.

 Management outlined initiatives across the company’s hardware and software offerings, including announcing its newest GPU architecture, Blackwell, which succeeds the Hopper architecture. 

Longer-term Nvidia sees Generative AI (GenAI) as a ~$100 trillion market, greenfield driving ~$250 billion annually and a brownfield demand of an additional ~$250 billion yearly.

Mizuho analyst Vijay Rakesh reiterated a Buy rating on Nvidia with a price target of $1,000.

The analyst flagged Nvidia pricing B100 at $30-40K, only ~25-30% higher than the current H100 at ~25K, while delivering 3-5x performance boost could be a challenge for Advanced Micro Devices, Inc AMD with aggressive pricing.

He noted Nvidia driving leadership with hardware excellence and software integration driving AI dominance, expecting AI industry revenues of over $400 billion by 2027E.

Rakesh projects first-quarter revenue and EPS of $24.01 billion and $5.52.

BofA analyst Vivek Arya reaffirmed a Buy rating on Nvidia with a price target of $1,100.

Arya noted that the session focused more on Nvidia expanding TAM and margin outlooks and deepening AI’s competitive moat.

The analyst flagged $250 billion annually in accelerated computing TAM representing just the upgrade portion of traditional data centers into accelerated data centers, with data center operators likely to gain more efficiency by replacing traditional computing (CPUs) over older GPUs. 

Blackwell GPU ASPs to range from $30-40k (vs. Hopper $20-30k), a more modest increase than anticipated, Arya pointed out. 

Despite a more modest price increase than anticipated, Nvidia expects Blackwell’s gross margins to maintain mid-70% levels by selling a more excellent mix of higher specified chip+NVLink+switch+system offerings.

Stifel analyst Ruben Roy maintained a Buy rating on Nvidia with a price target of $910.

The event reinforced the analyst’s belief that Nvidia AI infrastructure is rapidly enabling new business models, driving increased demand for Nvidia AI infrastructure.

Roy noted Nvidia is well positioned in markets that combine to yield an overall TAM of more than $100 billion exiting 2025 and a longer-term opportunity funnel worth $1 trillion. 

He said that most near-to-medium-term opportunities will come from high-performance computing, hyperscale and cloud data centers, and enterprise and edge computing. 

According to the analyst, the shift from general-purpose computing to accelerated computing represents the company’s most significant revenue and profitability growth opportunity over the next several years.

Goldman Sachs analyst Toshiya Hari maintained Nvidia with a Buy and raised the price target from $875 to $1,000.

Hari said that Nvidia’s decision to price the Blackwell platform competitively will hit its competitors like AMD. It also illustrates Nvidia’s priority on long-term gains vis-a-vis near-term profit margins.

Benchmark analyst Cody Acree reiterated Nvidia with a Buy and a $1,000 price target.

The analyst returned from the event as expected, encouraged and enthused by the company’s dominant position in the creation of the Generative AI industry, with all the systems, software, hardware, networking, chip design and manufacturing, and architectural capabilities to provide the next generation platform for the rapid adoption of AI throughout the global economy.

Acree finds Nvidia well positioned to lead the global market’s adoption of Generative, Inferencing, and Large Language Training Models across the breadth of industry verticals, cloud, and enterprise computing and a growing geographic base for at least the next several years and well beyond his current forecast period.

Acree projects first-quarter revenue and EPS of $24.50 billion and $5.55.

Piper Sandler analyst Harsh Kumar maintained Nvidia with an Overweight and raised the price target from $850 to $1,050.

The analyst noted the new architecture as an expansion of Nvidia’s hardware offering’s already dominant market positioning. 

He maintained that Nvidia is the leading company in offering the full hardware and software stack to address the decade-long transition to accelerated computing and generative AI. As noted in prior reports, the company has doubled its cadence to one major product release per year starting 2024.

Kumar projects first-quarter revenue and EPS of $24.01 billion and $5.41.

Price Action: NVDA shares traded lower by 0.95% at $885.33 on last check Wednesday.

Also Read: Huawei’s Ambitious AI Chip Developments Trigger Potential US Sanctions on Chinese Firms

Photo via Shutterstock

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