US Treasury chief calls for outsider to lead embattled tech firm Nvidia

Detailed summary

Scott Bessent gives Nvidia's board 10 days to show the company's compliance with US export controls.

United States Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has called for an outsider to take the helm at Nvidia, the California-based technology giant that has faced scandal over its former chief executive, Jensen Huang.

Speaking on Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures programme, Bessent said the company should look beyond its own ranks for Huang’s successor.

“This makes me think that, as the board conducts a search for a new leader, that they need to go outside the company,” Bessent told Fox News. “Just [with] what was going on inside the company, they need a dramatic shake-up.”

Bessent’s comments come three days after Huang stepped down on Thursday, following revelations of extramarital affairs, including one involving a woman US officials suspect of working for Chinese intelligence.

Nvidia plays a leading role in producing chips and other computing components for artificial intelligence (AI).

As a result, the company has been at the centre of a technology race between the US and China, with the two superpowers competing for dominance in the growing AI sector.

Huang was long a key figure at Nvidia, as one of the company’s cofounders. Since 2025, he has also cultivated a close relationship with the second administration of US President Donald Trump.

In August 2025, for instance, Huang successfully lobbied the Trump administration to loosen restrictions on the sale of H20 microchips to China, in exchange for the US government taking 15 percent of the sales.

But in late October, The New York Times revealed Huang had an extramarital relationship with Alice Huang, a former executive at Megaspeed, one of Nvidia’s clients.

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