Nvidia's August 26 Earnings Call Looms as China License Uncertainty and Circular-Financing Fears Collide
Published on 08/05/2026 at 16:12 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
The options market is pricing in fireworks, the chart is flashing momentum, and the bears are pointing to a $250 billion debt guarantee. For Nvidia shareholders, the next few weeks are shaping up as a high-stakes waiting game.
The stock closed Tuesday's German session at €183.66, up 2.28 percent on the day, paring its deficit to the 52-week high of €202.50 set in mid-May to roughly 9.3 percent. That rally has been fueled by a combination of fresh enthusiasm around AI infrastructure spending and a palpable sense that the worst of the regulatory overhang may be easing. The question now is whether the catalysts lining up ahead of the August 26 earnings call — the company reports fiscal Q2 2027 results after the quarter ended July 26 — can carry the shares the rest of the way.
A Demand Picture That's Hard to Argue With
The bull case has rarely looked more straightforward. Analyst Dan Ives of Yorkville & Ives puts Nvidia's chip demand-to-supply ratio at 12-to-1, arguing that the recent pullback represents a buying opportunity rather than a reason for caution. Supporting that view is a multi-year contract that infrastructure provider Corvex has signed with a leading AI company for liquid-cooled Blackwell GPU systems — the HGX B200 line paired with Quantum-2 InfiniBand networking. The deal is being funded through debt, customer prepayments and cash, notably without issuing new shares.
Then there's the endorsement from an unlikely corner. Elon Musk, speaking on SpaceX's earnings call, singled out the Vera Rubin platform for praise and said the company would standardize its compute infrastructure exclusively on Nvidia technology. SpaceX is targeting more than two gigawatts of compute capacity by the end of 2026, with plans to multiply that figure again by the end of 2027.
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The fundamentals back up the enthusiasm. Fiscal Q1 2027 revenue came in at $81.6 billion, up 85 percent year over year, with the data center segment alone contributing $75.2 billion — a 92 percent jump — at a 75 percent adjusted gross margin. Management has guided to $91 billion for the current quarter, plus or minus 2 percent. Of the 37 analysts covering the stock, 36 rate it a buy, with price targets ranging from $250 to $500. Tigress Financial sits at the top with $425, Evercore at $413, and the consensus lands somewhere between roughly $297 and $309 depending on the survey. Even the valuation debate cuts in Nvidia's favor: the forward price-to-earnings multiple, at around 18.9 to 22.8 depending on the calculation, sits below both the S&P 500 and the PHLX semiconductor index.
The China Question: Progress, But Not Yet Revenue
The regulatory picture has shifted in ways that could matter more than any single earnings print. In January 2026, the US Bureau of Industry and Security published a final rule moving Nvidia's H200 export licenses to China from a presumption of denial to case-by-case review. The conditions are stiff: a 25 percent import tariff, a 50 percent volume cap, mandatory third-party testing and strict customer vetting. Applicants must also demonstrate that exports to China won't diminish global chip production for US customers.
A limited license approved in February allows small H200 shipments to certain Chinese customers, but Nvidia has booked zero revenue from it so far. The company doesn't even know whether the chips can be imported — the license requires a US inspection before any delivery can proceed. It's a procedural loosening, not a green light, and the market is watching closely to see whether management changes its China assumptions in the upcoming report.
Nvidia's official guidance for the prior quarter excluded China entirely. The outlook for fiscal Q1 2027 assumed $78 billion in revenue, plus or minus 2 percent, with no data center revenue from China baked in. Whether the company adjusts that assumption on August 26 — or conspicuously declines to — could well determine the next major directional move.
The Skeptics' Playbook
Not everyone is buying the narrative. Michael Burry has been adding to his put positions against Nvidia, and the criticism centers on what bears call circular financing. The concern: Nvidia is reportedly backstopping roughly $250 billion in debt for an OpenAI data center in Ohio, while parallel deals between the SK Group and OpenAI, reportedly worth up to $750 billion, are circulating. The fear is that chipmakers, cloud providers and AI startups are funding each other in a loop, manufacturing demand that may not translate into sustainable end-customer revenue.
Aswath Damodaran, the NYU professor known as the "Dean of Valuation," exited his Nvidia position entirely in late 2025. He warns of a "Big Market Delusion," arguing that AI companies would need to generate $2 trillion to $4 trillion in industry-wide revenue to justify current valuations. His verdict: the stock is "priced for perfection" with no margin of safety. Bridgewater's Ray Dalio has drawn parallels to 1929 and 2000, citing rising equity issuance and interest rates in the AI sector as warning signs.
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Where the Chart Stands
The technical picture favors the bulls, at least for now. The stock trades 4.3 percent above its 50-day moving average of €178.85, with the RSI at 58.3 — positive but not overbought. The shares are 33.5 percent above their 52-week low, and the average analyst target of €262.72 implies roughly 41 percent upside from current levels. Annualized volatility sits at 37.8 percent, meaning any disappointment could be sharp.
The immediate test is whether the stock can hold above that 50-day line. If it does, the combination of a strong data center business and the potential for a China reopening could carry the shares toward the 52-week high and beyond. If the license implementation stalls, or the inspection bottleneck persists, the air could come out of the rally quickly — a significant portion of the recent gains already reflects good news.
The August 26 conference call, scheduled for 2 PM Pacific Time, will provide the clearest signal yet. Every word on China revenue assumptions — or their continued absence from guidance — will be parsed for what it means for the rally's next leg. With demand metrics this strong and skepticism this loud, the earnings call is shaping up as the moment the market finds out which side has the better read.
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