Nuclear Stocks Are On The Rise Today: What's Going On?

Shares of nuclear energy companies, including Nano Nuclear Energy Inc. NNE, Oklo Inc. OKLO and NuScale Power Corporation SMR are trading lower Monday following the emergence of China’s DeepSeek AI model, which has triggered uncertainty across multiple sectors.

What To Know: DeepSeek's latest large language model (LLM), which has quickly gained traction by surpassing OpenAI's ChatGPT and Meta's Llama 3.1 on Apple's App Store, has sparked fears that AI investments could be redirected. It is pressuring sectors such as nuclear power that depend on technological partnerships and AI-driven optimizations.

The revelation that DeepSeek built its model in just two months for under $6 million using restricted Nvidia chips has further fueled market unease, prompting a broader sell-off in technology-driven industries, including nuclear energy.

However, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives downplays these concerns, arguing that the sell-off presents a "golden buying opportunity" rather than a legitimate threat to AI investment. Ives asserts that major global enterprises are unlikely to rely on a Chinese startup like DeepSeek for their AI infrastructure needs, meaning long-term demand for advanced AI capabilities—critical to the nuclear energy sector’s growth and efficiency—remains intact.

Ives emphasizes that the AI sector's focus is on enterprise applications and infrastructure, which are expected to see $2 trillion in capital expenditures over the next three years. He contends that nuclear energy companies leveraging AI technologies for operational improvements, predictive maintenance and safety enhancements will continue to benefit from sustained investments in established AI firms such as Nvidia, Microsoft and Alphabet.

Price Action: Nano Nuclear Energy shares fell 25.7% to $33.14. Oklo shares dropped 28.4% to $29.94. NuScale Power shares declined 29.2% to $19.8 at the time of writing, according to Benzinga Pro.

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Photo: Bigjom Jom via Shutterstock.