NVIDIA CORP (NVDA) — Fundamental Analysis

NVIDIA has undergone one of the most dramatic financial transformations in the history of large-cap technology companies. Driven by explosive demand for its AI accelerator chips, the company grew annual revenue from roughly $27 billion in fiscal 2023 to $216 billion in fiscal 2026 — a near-eightfold increase in just three years. Profitability has followed: net margins now sit above 55%, the balance sheet carries almost no meaningful debt, and the business generates cash so efficiently that capital expenditures remain a small fraction of revenue even as spending scales in absolute terms. The most recent quarter (ended April 2026) pushed margins even higher, with net income representing over 71 cents of every dollar of revenue. By virtually every fundamental measure — growth, profitability, leverage, and liquidity — NVIDIA is operating at an exceptional level, though investors should keep in mind that sustaining this trajectory depends heavily on continued AI infrastructure spending by hyperscale cloud customers.

Snapshot & Big Picture

NVIDIA's fiscal year ends in late January. The figures below cover the most recent completed fiscal year (ended January 26, 2025 and January 25, 2026) alongside the longer historical arc dating back to fiscal 2016. What stands out immediately is the step-change in scale: revenue that took the company decades to build to roughly $27 billion was then more than doubled, then doubled again, inside 36 months. EBITDA followed in lockstep, reaching $133 billion in fiscal 2026, a figure larger than the total revenue of most Fortune 100 companies.

Note: Fiscal year 2019 (ended Jan 2019) data was not present in the provided filings. Margin and EBITDA data for fiscal year 2015 were not available in the filing.

Latest Quarter Snapshot

The most recent data point — and the most current view of NVIDIA's financial condition — is the quarter ended April 26, 2026, reported in the 10-Q filed May 20, 2026. This is more current than the annual figures above and shows the business continuing to accelerate rather than plateau.

A single quarter produced $81.6 billion in revenue — more than triple what the entire company generated in fiscal 2021. The net margin of 71.5% is particularly notable: it is above the full-year fiscal 2026 net margin of 55.6%, reflecting either favorable one-time items or continued operating leverage. The current ratio of 3.44x and near-negligible debt-to-equity of 0.043 confirm that liquidity remains very strong even as the business invests heavily in absolute dollar terms.

Profitability

NVIDIA's profitability trend over the past decade tells a compelling story of structural margin expansion. In fiscal 2016, the company earned just 12.3 cents of net income per dollar of revenue. By fiscal 2022 that had risen to 36 cents. Then came the AI demand surge: fiscal 2024 saw net margins approach 49%, and fiscal 2025 and 2026 both landed near 56%. The fiscal 2023 dip — where operating margins compressed to just 15.7% — reflected an inventory correction and weaker gaming demand that briefly masked the company's underlying earnings power. That proved temporary. Gross margins have also expanded meaningfully, moving from the high-50s percentage range in the mid-2010s to 71–75% in recent years, as data center GPU sales (which carry superior economics to gaming) became the dominant revenue source. The most recent quarter's 71.5% net margin suggests operating leverage has not yet peaked.

Financial Health

NVIDIA's balance sheet has strengthened considerably as profits have accumulated. Debt-to-equity, which stood at roughly 0.49x in fiscal 2023, fell to 0.054x by fiscal 2026 and dropped further to 0.043x in the latest quarter — essentially negligible financial leverage. The current ratio has remained comfortably above 3x throughout the recent growth period, indicating the company holds ample short-term assets relative to near-term obligations.

On capital expenditures: NVIDIA is a fabless semiconductor designer, meaning it outsources manufacturing to foundries like TSMC rather than owning its own fabs. This keeps capital intensity structurally low relative to its revenue base.

In absolute dollar terms, CapEx has risen sharply — from $1.1B in fiscal 2024 to $6.0B in fiscal 2026 — reflecting investment in infrastructure, tooling, and leased data center capacity. However, as a percentage of revenue, capital intensity has actually stayed low and relatively stable in the 1.8%–2.8% range during the AI boom years, and was even lower (2.2%) in the latest quarter. The fiscal 2023 spike to 6.8% was a transient artifact of spending against a temporarily depressed revenue base. The overall picture is of a capital-light model that generates substantial free cash flow: reinvestment needs are modest relative to the earnings being produced.

Growth

The revenue CAGR figures below were calculated directly from NVIDIA's SEC filings and capture the extraordinary pace of growth across multiple time horizons.

A three-year revenue CAGR of exactly 100% — meaning revenue doubled on average every single year for three consecutive years — is essentially without precedent for a company of NVIDIA's size. Even the longer 10-year CAGR of 46.7% is remarkable, as it reflects sustained compounding that predates the AI wave and speaks to the company's durable competitive position in high-performance computing. The key question for forward-looking investors is not whether NVIDIA grew fast, but whether the hyperscaler capital expenditure cycle that powered this growth continues, moderates, or reverses.

Source Filings

• 10-Q filed May 20, 2026 — Quarter ended April 26, 2026
• 10-K filed February 25, 2026 — Fiscal year ended January 25, 2026