Nvidia Corporation has driven the industry forward as a leader in graphics processing units (GPUs). They’ve experienced an amazing appreciation in their market cap, recently giving them a higher valuation than any other company in history. Despite this scrutiny, founder and CEO Jensen Huang has awarded himself a massive pay raise while the company has remained successful. This is the first increase in his base salary in a decade.
Effective immediately, Huang’s base salary has increased to $1.5 million, a 49% increase from last year. Just last week, Nvidia announced that its revenues had skyrocketed 114% for the recently completed 2025 fiscal year. Their profits skyrocketed to a staggering $130.5 billion! The company’s GPUs are now the silicon driving some of the most complex and demanding artificial intelligence models and workloads, dramatically increasing its growth.
Including base salary, Huang’s total compensation for 2025 is $49.9 million. This figure takes into account $3.5 million that has been designated for residential security consultations and driver services. In 2024, these costs ballooned to $2.2 million. This record-breaking jump serves to exemplify Nvidia’s expanding international footprint, along with the rising expenses that accompany this transition.
Huang’s variable cash compensation increased by $1 million. This is a historic jump of 50% over fiscal year 2022. Additionally, his stock awards increased to a staggering $38.8 million. Huang’s stake in Nvidia, which amounts to about 3.5% of the company, is now worth about $94 billion. This impressive valuation further underscores his serious financial pledge to the company’s long-term success.
In so doing, Nvidia has generated some incredible PR performance with its megawatt stock price. It went up over nine times from the end of 2022 to the end of last year. However, Nvidia’s compensation committee made a shrewd decision to raise Huang’s base salary. Instead, they zeroed in on pay equity among their own top executives.
“It represented Mr. Huang’s first base salary increase in 10 years,” – Nvidia’s compensation committee
“Believed this was appropriate in consideration of internal pay equity with the base salaries,” – Nvidia’s compensation committee
The recent proxy filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) disclosed these details about Huang’s pay structure, highlighting the company’s commitment to aligning executive compensation with its rapid growth and success.